Having a dream backed by a lifelong passion is one thing, but it takes a leap faith – and a lot of perseverance – to make that dream a reality. Local singer/songwriter Joline Baylis has embarked on a journey to make music her career, punching out of day job and committing to her dream of being on stage.

“I had this idea that unless you can be famous, don’t bother,” Joline, who is actually a former classmate of mine from high school, told me over the phone this morning. She admits that while she’s played for 20 years, she had never considered taking the step to the next level until very recently. “I just never thought it was something I could actually live off of so that’s what I’m trying to do now for the first time.”

“Music wasn’t even something I was thinking about at all but it just kind of became a big part of my life. It’s almost like it built its own momentum and it’s just been carrying me along — sometimes willingly sometimes less willingly. It’s like okay, I’m in for it, I’m along for the ride.”

Last year Joline left her office job and took up busking for a living. She found a sustainable niche playing on the streets and seawalls of Vancouver, providing a soundtrack for audiences captivated by a sunset at English Bay. “People are already there relaxing, watching the sunset, and they’ll tend to stick around for a few songs, buy a CD, and keep in touch. They actually do become fans.”

Eventually she found herself stuck in first gear, with hesitation about her new career path building. “I can support myself with busking, and I did that for about a year. But at this point it’s a lot of playing, and a lot of repetition since you’re playing the same songs every day, sometimes three times a day. It becomes a grind, even like a day job, which is the whole reason I wanted to get out of office work in the first place. It’s a routine and I didn’t want to do that to music.”

Music, Joline explains, is about giving something of value, and it has a real power to move people when the musician is feeling that same vibe and not standing in front of a crowd projecting their own stress and anxiety about making ends meet. Her new focus is on recording, touring, and kicking her career into that next gear with an Indiegogo campaign for her first album.

“It’s interested because you find out that ‘the dream’ is nothing like what you imagined it would be. Especially nowadays the way the industry is, the way that social media is involved. As an independent artist there are so many ways to live that dream. You can make your own way and there’s obviously an industry that you need to work through but there are also so many avenues to express yourself and create your own opportunities, which is encouraging.”

She credits much of her newfound momentum to her collaborators, such as Kenton Loewen (Dan Mangan and Blacksmith, The Crackling), Wynston Minckler (Bocephus King, Tim Sars) and Paul Pigat, who has played with the likes of Neko Case and Carolyn Mark.

“I wouldn’t be doing music at all if it weren’t for the people that I’ve met who have helped me, played with me, encouraged me, and taught me. It’s a very supportive team.” Joline admits that she’s almost glad that this album didn’t happen sooner because at this point she feels it’s happening the right way, in a professional manner.

Photo: Joline Baylis on Facebook

Trusting her gut, and her talent, has got her this far and she’s looking forward to what lies ahead. “I still have a lot to learn but I’m excited because once I know how things work a bit more and what the tasks are that need to be done, then it’s a lot easier to do them. Motivation comes then when you feel like you can start to make some headway and be productive.”

At time of publishing, there are 11 days left to support Joline’s dream via the Indiegogo campaign for her debut album. Perks include everything from digital downloads and show tickets to hand-knit fingerless gloves (another talent of Joline’s), to art prints and producer credits. She will then record at Afterlife Studios (in the legendary Mushroom recording space), under the guidance of John Raham.

Upcoming Show + Links

On June 12th you can catch Joline at the Media Club playing with Kenton Loewen and Wynston Minckler, in support of The Sands (Julie McGeer, Peggy Lee, JP Carter, Paul Rigby, Patrick Metzger, Barry Mirochnic) with The Crackling (Kenton Loewen) opening the night.

Tickets are available at Highlife, Red Cat and Zulu Records, or can be purchased directly from members of the bands.

Follow Joline on Twitter, Facebook, and her campaign’s Facebook group for more information. Her Indiegogo campaign ends on Friday, May 22, 2015.

The Pemberton Music Festival lineup has been announced, tickets are on sale, and thousands of fun seekers are planning their trip to this amazing summer event from Thursday, July 16th through Sunday, July 19th. Pemberton Music Festival has your favourite artists, an amazing setting, activities, adventure, and an incredible music experience all rolled into one.

All photos credit: Keri Coles, www.kericoles.com, pembertonmusicfestival.com

Pemberton Festival Lineup

Win Tickets to Pemberton Music Festival

I have one pair of General Admission tickets to the 2015 Pemberton Music Festival with the winner’s choice of a pair of camping or shuttle passes. Each valued at $388! Here’s how you can enter to win:

• Leave a comment naming the artist you’re dying to see live on stage at Pemberton Music Festival this year (1 entry)
• Post the following on Twitter (1 entry)

You can also enter on Instagram by posting this image and including @Miss604 + @Pemberton_Fest:

I will draw one winner at random from all entries at 12:00pm on Monday, May 18, 2015.

Follow Pemberton Music Festival on Twitter and Facebook for more information. The four-day contemporary music festival is produced and promoted by HUKA Entertainment, in collaboration with the Village of Pemberton and land partners the Sunstone Group, the Lil’wat Nation and Squamish-Lillooet Regional District.

Update The winner is Alexia Davies on Instagram!

On a gloriously sunny Friday afternoon I was whisked away by Sky Helicopters for a meeting at their hangar in Pitt Meadows. Taking off from the helipad on Waterfront Road in Downtown Vancouver, as PA announcements from cruise ships docked at Canada Place echoed throughout the harbour, I hopped in for one unique ride.

Sky Helicopters operates charters, can be hired for executive lunches, meeting, events (the hangar is also an event space), weddings, and can host wine tours, heli-fishing, and a fun afternoon of sightseeing. My trip was very quick but exhilarating all the same as it’s always fun to soar 1000ft above our region to get a new perspective on its beauty — and growth. Here are some of my photos from above Vancouver, Port Moody, Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam and Pitt Meadows:

View more photos in my album on Flickr. For more information about helicopter sightseeing, follow Sky Helicopters on Facebook and Twitter.

This post has been contributed by Kathleen Stormont, Fundraising and Communications Specialist with the Stanley Park Ecology Society (“SPES”). I have been following SPES since I moved into the West End a decade ago and I have been a member for three years. I wanted to offer the team an opportunity to share their news, events, and work so I have created “SPES Saturday” where they contribute and share stories with my audience once a month.

Stanley Park in the Wake of the English Bay Oil Spill

On April 8, 2015, Bunker C fuel spilled into Vancouver’s English Bay from the new bulk grain carrier M/V Marathassa. The ship’s fuel ultimately oiled beaches from Stanley Park to West Vancouver with some evidence of oil showing up in Burrard Inlet at New Brighton Park. The local sailor who reported the spill described seeing thousands of blobs of oil ranging from “pea size” to “fist size” floating below the ocean surface.

Twelve hours after the first sighting of oil, containment and clean up began. The Coast Guard asserted that with surface skimmers, booms and absorbent pads “80 per cent of the spill was not only contained, but was recovered within 36 hours”.¹ However, Bunker C oil is a very heavy oil; it sinks, leaving only a fraction of the spill on the beaches and the ocean surface. According to US oil spill response expert and former oil and gas industry professional, Anita M. Burke, less than 30% of the oil spilled in ANY oil spill has ever been recovered.²

How much oil was actually spilled and recovered since April 8 therefore remains unclear, as does the spill’s impact on the harbour’s ecosystem and Stanley Park’s fragile intertidal zones.

(For a detailed overview of the spill timeline, roles and responsibilities, and communications, read: Marathassa Oil Spill Interim Update to Vancouver City Council, April 14, 2015)

Distribution of oil from April 8, 2015 oil spill in English Bay (map provided by City of Vancouver)

Compared to catastrophic tanker spills like the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster, Vancouver’s recent oil spill was almost diminutive in size. An estimated 2700 to 5000 litres⁷ of Bunker C oil spilled into the harbour – a drop in the bucket beside the Exxon Valdez’s loss of 11 to 38 million US gallons (41 to 144 million litres) of crude oil. But even small quantities of the highly toxic Bunker C oil may seriously impact the harbour ecosystem. According to NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration), very heavy oils like Bunker C can persist in the environment for months or even years. In the short term, these heavy oils smother marine organisms while the long term effects of toxicity may cause tumours and chronic health problems in some organisms. Twenty six years later, the herring population in Valdez, for example, has yet to recover.

Oil stains boulders on Second Beach, April 8, 2015. (Photo by Deana Lancaster, Vancouver Aquarium)

Intertidal habitats are especially vulnerable to an oil spill. In Stanley Park, the zone between high and low tide stretches nearly nine kilometers across rocky, cobble and sand beaches supporting a food web of bacteria and protozoa, plankton, sponges, worms, seaweeds (including extensive kelp forests), crustaceans, mollusks, and fish . The Park’s great blue herons, eagles, river otters, shore birds and sea ducks are all a part of this web. On the western shoreline by Siwash Rock, mussel beds provide food for a globally significant population of wintering Barrow’s Goldeneye and thousands of blue-listed Surf Scoters. An oil spill several kilometers away from Stanley Park could devastate local bird populations like these. The oil not only mats the birds’ feathers exposing them to hypothermia, but smothers and poisons the fragile food web on which they, and all the intertidal life, depend.

Hundreds of surf scoters gather offshore in Stanley Park. (Photo by Don Enright)

Any effects of the April 8 oil spill on Stanley Park’s shoreline ecosystem may not manifest themselves for some time as the toxins from the Bunker C oil work their way through the food web. In order to recognize any negative impacts on the shoreline ecosystem, we must first understand what a healthy intertidal system looks like. But, to date no thorough surveys of the Park’s intertidal and subtidal zones have been conducted. This baseline information would enable us track the health of the ecosystem over time and recognize any negative impacts resulting from an oil spill or other environmental disaster.

“The fuel spill highlights the need for long-term monitoring of [coastal] ecosystems, which doesn’t currently take place,” observes the Vancouver Aquarium.³ A year ago, Dr. Peter Ross founded the Vancouver Aquarium’s Coastal Ocean Research Institute to conduct studies and gather information about BC’s coastal environments which “… will establish a baseline for ocean health and allow us to track pollutants.”⁴

The Canadian Coast Guard states that it will also “…oversee and implement a number of long-term monitoring programs following the M/V Marathassa fuel spill in English Bay… [and continue] the environmental assessment and sampling program…” As a precautionary measure against contamination in the inter- and sub-tidal zones, the Coast Guard closed the recreational fishery in English Bay. Sediment and Starry flounder, dungeness and red rock crab, and mussel sampling is ongoing.⁵

The reality is 26 years after the devastating Exxon Valdez spill, oil spill knowledge and clean up technologies have advanced little. Today’s unconventional oils, like Bitumen and the Bunker C fuel spilled into English Bay, are non-buoyant. Traditional surface-focused oil spill response is, in most cases, ineffective against these highly toxic, heavy, viscous oils. The devastation Vancouver’s harbour and Stanley Park could face in the wake of a more substantial oil spill is immense. In an oil port, Anita M. Burke believes it is inevitable.⁶

Be prepared:
If you see oil on the water, contact the Canadian Coast Guard: 1-800-889-8852
If you see oil on the shore, contact Emergency Management BC: 1-888-663-3456

Resources

• Marathassa Oil Spill Interim Update to Vancouver City Council, April 14, 2015
• Marathassa Spill Response: A record of Unified Command’s daily updates from April 12 – April 23, 2015
• What is Bunker C fuel?
• Wyler, Rex and Kelly, Mary. July 2012. Oils Spills and Vancouver’s Stanley Park. Wilderness Committee, Tanker Free BC
• Worcester, R. 2010. State of the Park Report for the Ecological Integrity of Stanley Park. Stanley Park Ecology Society.
• Living Oceans Society
• The ALERT Project

References
¹ Statement by Jody Thomas, Commissioner of the Canadian Coast Guard – Marathassa oil spill, April 12, 2015

⁷ Vancouver oil spill might be bigger than expected, April 14, 2015. Vancouver Courier

This morning the FIFA Women’s World Cup Countdown Clock at YVR, which now displays just 29 days until kickoff of the World Cup in Canada, will be on the move to a new, prominent location in Vancouver.

Photo credit: Canada Soccer on Flickr

Countdown Clock on the Move

Throughout the day today and over the weekend, I’ll be posting photo clues about the new location of the countdown clock. You can take a guess at its new location via the comments or Twitter, and when you do, you’ll be entered to win an amazing FIFA Women’s World Cup prize pack:

• 2 tickets to the opening match at BC Place on June 8th featuring reigning world champions Japan vs Switzerland. It is also a doubleheader at BC Place, and will have a match between Ecuador and Cameroon as well.
• A Fan Pack including a mini version of the official football (adidas Conext 15 ); 2 FIFA Women’s World Cup Canada 2015™hats; 2 FIFA Women’s World Cup Canada 2015™ drawstring backpacks

Countdown Clock Clues: How to Enter to Win

COMING SOON! Look to this area for clues about the new location of the countdown clock. If you can guess where it is, post the following on Twitter:

Starting location / New Location

New Location / New Location

New clue! Saturday, May 9th:

Tickets on Sale Now

Don’t miss FIFA Women’s World Cup action in Vancouver this summer as Canada hosts the most important international competition in women’s soccer from June 6th to July 5th, 2015. This is the first major sporting event in Canada to be hosted from coast to coast, with matches to be played in Vancouver, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Ottawa, Montréal, Québec and Moncton.

Tickets are on sale starting at $20.15 for group stage matches and fans will also have the opportunity to attend any match, competition-wide, for fifty dollars or less – including the final in Vancouver – making this an extremely affordable world-class event.

I will draw one winner from all guesses (blog comments/Twitter, and photos) on Monday, May 11, 2015 at 12:00pm.

Update The winner is @waterboy99troop!