{"id":20422,"date":"2016-07-21T15:53:41","date_gmt":"2016-07-21T19:53:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/?p=20422"},"modified":"2024-08-09T07:42:18","modified_gmt":"2024-08-09T11:42:18","slug":"avalanche-success-talented-music-grad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/2016\/avalanche-success-talented-music-grad\/","title":{"rendered":"An Avalanche of Success for Talented Music Grad"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<section class=\"w-screen px-6 cu-section cu-section--white ml-offset-center md:px-8 lg:px-14\">\n    <div class=\"space-y-6 cu-max-w-child-5xl  md:space-y-10 cu-prose-first-last\">\n\n            <div class=\"cu-textmedia flex flex-col lg:flex-row mx-auto gap-6 md:gap-10 my-6 md:my-12 first:mt-0 max-w-5xl\">\n        <div class=\"justify-start cu-textmedia-content cu-prose-first-last\" style=\"flex: 0 0 100%;\">\n            <header class=\"font-light prose-xl cu-pageheader md:prose-2xl cu-component-updated cu-prose-first-last\">\n                                    <h1 class=\"cu-prose-first-last font-semibold !mt-2 mb-4 md:mb-6 relative after:absolute after:h-px after:bottom-0 after:bg-cu-red after:left-px text-3xl md:text-4xl lg:text-5xl lg:leading-[3.5rem] pb-5 after:w-10 text-cu-black-700 not-prose\">\n                        An Avalanche of Success for Talented Music Grad\n                    <\/h1>\n                \n                                \n                            <\/header>\n\n                    <\/div>\n\n            <\/div>\n\n    <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>by Nick Ward<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The title track of <em>Avalanche<\/em>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kallemattson.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Mattson\u2019s<\/a> fifth studio&nbsp;release, was nominated for Video of Year for the 2016&nbsp;Juno Awards and has won the 2016 Prism Prize Award&nbsp;for Best Canadian Music Video.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Six months after its release, the video\u2014which reimagines&nbsp;35 classic album covers, from Jay-Z to Springsteen to&nbsp;Wilco\u2014has over 130,000 views on YouTube and has&nbsp;helped solidify the indie rocker as a rising star on the&nbsp;Canadian national music scene. A skillfully written,&nbsp;upbeat track with a hint of melancholy, <em>Avalanche<\/em>&nbsp;is representative of Mattson\u2019s dexterous and&nbsp;impressive discography.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure><div class=\"c-video\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Kalle Mattson - &quot;Avalanche&quot; (Official Video)\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/upuFf_JlfF8?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI try not to think about genres or how to classify my&nbsp;music at all, I don\u2019t think it\u2019s helpful when making&nbsp;songs,\u201d explained Mattson. \u201cI do think my songs are&nbsp;in line with some sort of folk tradition, or Canadian&nbsp;songwriting tradition, but at the same time not stuck&nbsp;in the past, and I really try to incorporate more&nbsp;modern and pop production techniques in my records.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Prism Award and the Juno nomination are&nbsp;not Mattson\u2019s only prominent recognitions. He was&nbsp;also nominated for a Polaris Music Prize in 2014&nbsp;for his most recent full-length album, <a href=\"https:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/ca\/album\/someday-the-moon-will-be-gold\/id797838066\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em>Someday,&nbsp;The Moon Will Be Gold<\/em><\/a>, which he described as \u201can&nbsp;extremely personal record in which I felt I took a lot&nbsp;of risks in the subject matter, but also financially&nbsp;in recording and self-releasing it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"not-prose cu-quote cu-component-spacing\">\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>The biggest thing I got out of my time at Carleton was a work ethic and the knowledge of how to practise well and how to make the best use of your time practising. I use that every day.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p>Although he\u2019s just 25 years old, Mattson carries himself&nbsp;with distinguished composure and pragmatism.&nbsp;When asked about these accolades, he responded with&nbsp;the confident sensibility of a cagey industry veteran.&nbsp;\u201cIt feels like a nice sort of benchmark accomplishment.&nbsp;Awards mean something to everyone, you don\u2019t really&nbsp;have to justify it, everyone knows what it is and what it&nbsp;means. You never go into making music with the goal&nbsp;of winning them, but when it does happen it\u2019s a really&nbsp;nice surprise to be recognized for your work.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Originally from Sault Ste. Marie, Mattson came to&nbsp;Carleton\u2019s Music program in 2010 to refine his craft.&nbsp;\u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/carleton.ca\/music\/people\/stewart-jesse\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Professor Jesse Stewart<\/a> had a big effect on me. I had&nbsp;quite a few classes with him in my four years and he&nbsp;really expanded my view of music and composition.&nbsp;Really, I think that one of the main things university&nbsp;is supposed to do is just expand your thinking and&nbsp;expose you to new things.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Mattson isn\u2019t certain whether or not acquiring a university&nbsp;degree is going to make or break a songwriter\u2019s career,&nbsp;but he does believe it helps provide musicians with&nbsp;\u201cthe tools to be able to do your job better\u2014theory, ear&nbsp;training, that sort of thing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe biggest thing I got out of my time at Carleton was&nbsp;a work ethic and the knowledge of how to practise well&nbsp;and how to make the best use of your time practising.&nbsp;I use that every day.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Mattson is currently writing and recording his&nbsp;upcoming full-length album and is preparing to&nbsp;play with Canadian icon Jason Collett. Mattson&nbsp;has a variety of tour dates and festivals for 2016,&nbsp;checkout <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kallemattson.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">www.kallemattson.com<\/a> for details.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For those aspiring artists reading this article, Mattson&nbsp;suggests, \u201cYou never know if you never try, and if you&nbsp;never try, you never know.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Wise advice from a young success story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Carleton\u2019s Bachelor of Music (BMus) program now&nbsp;has a Singer-songwriter stream which features&nbsp;related courses, research, performance and artists&nbsp;in residence working with songwriters. Carleton\u2019s&nbsp;BMus is the only program in Canada (and one of&nbsp;only a few in the world) to have a Singer-songwriter&nbsp;stream. For more information, please visit:&nbsp;<a href=\"http:\/\/carleton.ca\/music\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">carleton.ca\/music<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Nick Ward The title track of Avalanche, Mattson\u2019s fifth studio&nbsp;release, was nominated for Video of Year for the 2016&nbsp;Juno Awards and has won the 2016 Prism Prize Award&nbsp;for Best Canadian Music Video. Six months after its release, the video\u2014which reimagines&nbsp;35 classic album covers, from Jay-Z to Springsteen to&nbsp;Wilco\u2014has over 130,000 views on YouTube and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20425,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[167,87,44,97,35],"tags":[259,260,261,262],"class_list":["post-20422","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","category-fassinate","category-for-students","category-music","category-ssac","tag-avalanche","tag-kalle-mattson","tag-polaris-music-prize","tag-prism-prize-award"],"acf":{"cu_post_thumbnail":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20422","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20422"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20422\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34145,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20422\/revisions\/34145"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20425"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20422"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20422"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/fass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20422"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}