This Is for You, 2020

This Is for You (An Elegy for My Father), 2020
Three-channel HD Video with 5.1 Surround Sound
Featuring Julia McIntyre on Bass Trombone

9’10”

This Is for You is an elegiac song featuring prominent Canadian bass trombonist, Julia McIntyre. Situated in an antiquated theatre in Winnipeg, Manitoba, the video drifts through a musical lament, followed by an ode of praise, and eventually concluding with a movement of solace.

The artwork is dedicated to the artist’s father, Murray Crewe (1960-2017), who was the longtime mentor of Julia McIntyre. A bass trombonist himself, he gifted his instrument to his student, Julia, after falling ill a few years before his death in 2017. As Julia’s physical breath moves through the instrument, the bass trombone becomes an extension of her body, and her musical voice reverberates in an empty theatre.

A now weathered object, the trombone itself holds physical remnants of the artist’s father. His fingerprints are embedded within the brass. Skin and oil residue is ingrained throughout the instrument, showing decades of handling and wear. This Is for You is a narrative about memory, loss and wading through grief.

Video + Textural Sound by Emilie Crewe | Camera: Sebnem Ozpeta & Emilie Crewe

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.
Nous remercions le Conseil des arts du Canada de son soutien.

As Julia unpacks the layers of her own practice in the video, I am unravelling an unexpected, elegiac song that is an ode to my father. While Julia moves through the grief she is experiencing as her career as a musician transforms into the unknown (she is studying engineering and architecture after retiring from the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra), I am similarly working through the grief of losing my dad (and for her, the loss of her long-time mentor). As the artwork takes shape, I am overcome with awe... at how resilient we are as humans, at how music moves us, at how the creative process heals us, and at the strangeness of just being here.