Runcible Spoon

Runcible Spoon is an innovative chamber jazz ensemble that features the talents of cellist Monica Fedrigo, violist Pamela Bettger, clarinetist Julia Hambleton, pianist Tania Gill and singer Leah State. Their music draws from a wide range of influences including jazz, classical, folk, improvised music and cabaret.

The group started as an instrumental quartet in 2001, experimenting with ways of using their unique instrumentation to improvise and arrange jazz material and traditional folk music. Shortly afterwards, jazz vocalist Leah State joined the band. In March 2002, the group embarked on an artist residency at the Banff Centre for the Arts, where they composed, rehearsed, received coaching and advice from guitarist/composer Bill Coon, and recorded their first CD.

Their consequent success led to numerous performances in Toronto, throughout Southern Ontario, and at jazz festivals including the Atlantic Jazz Festival in Halifax, the Ottawa Jazz Festival, the Downtown Toronto Jazz Festival and the Toronto Fringe Jazz Festival. They have regularly held weekly residencies at Toronto’s Rex Jazz Bar. In 2003 and again in 2005 Runcible Spoon toured British Columbia where they played to packed houses. The second of these tours featured Juno award winning violinist and improviser Jesse Zubot and showcased material from the band’s second CD, Raincoat Lake.

Raincoat Lake was recorded in July 2005. The critically acclaimed CD features original compositions, a suite composed by Toronto bassist/composer Andrew Downing, and arrangements of music by Kurt Weill, George Gershwin and Cole Porter. The music is at times orchestral, playful, swinging, sentimental, angular, dissonant, humorous and passionate.