Different Drummers
Squid blends high-flying sticks and acrobatics in innovative show

October 18th, 2005

By Andrea Nemetz
Entertainment Reporter
The Chronicle Herald

The members of Squid seem pleasantly surprised that they’re making a living making music.

The five twenty-something musicians – four percussionists and one piper – are currently dazzling audiences in DRUM! a song, dance and musical spectacle that celebrates four Nova Scotian cultures: Acadian, black, Celtic and Mi’kmaq. Under the direction of Tim French (The Producers), and musical direction of Doris Mason, who also plays keyboards and sings, the show is running at the specially built DRUM! theatre at Pier 20 until Saturday at 8 p.m.

Squid has been together, in various incarnations, since the beginnings of DRUM! when Brookes Diamond was putting together a grand celebration of Nova Scotian talent to be staged during the visit of the Tall Ships in 2000. But it’s only in the last couple of years that Squid’s members have focused on a full-time career.

Ian MacMillan, at 29 the oldest of the group, is the link that brought Squid together.

Inspired to take up percussion by Animal from the Muppets and the fact that a girl he liked was going into percussion in the school band, MacMillan, who grew up in Fall River, began tapping out rhythms when he was 11. He also took lessons from Matthieu Keijser, who introduced him to Diamond.

“Percussion was a passion, but it was always a hobby until it turned into a moneymaker when I started teaching at 15,” he says, following an afternoon rehearsal for DRUM!

An instructor at the Dartmouth Pipe Band, where Squid members Ryan Fraser, Daniel St. Pierre, Matthew Guest and Mark Jamieson all learned to play their instruments, MacMillan was initially asked by Diamond to put together a snare drum routine for the Tall Ships.

“I put together nine snare drummers and the audience reaction was so good, standing ovations, we decided to continue,” MacMillan says.

“It was at DrumFest in 2001 that we decided we should push the boundaries. Instead of playing music, we wanted to be a show.”

The group’s aim is to play aggressive, Celtic percussion with a focus on a military snare presented in a visually stunning way, he continues, noting the group’s choreographed routines, blending high-flying sticks and acrobatics, don’t exist in traditional drumming competition.

“You can watch a really good drum line for maybe five minutes,” adds St. Pierre, 22. “We wanted to do a show that would make people want to watch for 45 minutes.”

A Fall River native, who recently graduated from Dalhousie with a BSc in economics, St. Pierre began playing drums about 10 years ago.

“My sister was a bagpiper and the whole family would go to competitions on weekends and I wanted to get involved. The pipes didn’t interest me. Drums did. Still I kept trying to quit. But now I’m glad I stuck with it.”

St. Pierre and Jamieson, 22, a Dartmouth native who began drumming at 12 in the school band, came up through the pipe band ranks at the same time and both played in the DRUM! segment that was showcased on the 2001 ECMA broadcast from Charlottetown.

Fraser, 20, an accounting major at Saint Mary’s University, is taking the semester off because of DRUM!.

The band’s piper, he is newer to Squid, joining in 2002.

“My uncle played when I was seven and he asked if I wanted to play. I’d always enjoyed listening to him play, so I took some private lessons then joined Dartmouth Pipes and Drums. I began taking it seriously when I was around 10 and started winning competitions. I was Atlantic Canadian Champion Supreme in Grade 5 and I realized how fun it was to win.”

The Dartmouth native also played trumpet for five years and messes around with guitars, but focuses his attention on the pipes.

Matthew Guest, 26, of Cole Harbour started drumming at 11, following in the footsteps of his brother.

“My band teacher told me I’d be a terrible percussionist and suggested I try flute,” he says with a laugh.

“I really started to enjoy it when I joined the pipe band at 14. Ian was my first instructor. Coming in knowing how to read drum music helped.”

Guest, who spent 20 months in the Canadian Forces and who has worked as a personal trainer among various other part-time jobs says performing in Squid has been his most enjoyable job.

“You’re getting paid for doing something you enjoy to begin with.”

The ultimate goal of Squid, who were jolted into the public eye with appearances at the Halifax International Buskers Festival in 2004 and 2005, is to do its own theatre show, and performing in DRUM! gives the quintet practice being on stage in a theatre atmosphere, says Fraser.

“It’s exciting to see the support for a big show. We had tailored our show to the street so there was no lighting crew and without them we couldn’t do the black light effects. It’s a whole different level,” says MacMillan.

“A lot of the aspects of the Squid show are brought in to DRUM!,” says MacMillan, adding the band members also play percussion parts that have nothing to do with Squid.

Among the percussion innovations is when the group plays on stools.

“It’s a huge rock-out, exclusively percussion with Brian Bourne and Dave Burton on kits. The focus is on the raw beats. There’s no melody. A lot of what we do is accompanying melodies,” says MacMillan.

Fraser is also performing more as a traditional piper than he does in Squid shows in which he can be found spinning on the floor.

Besides their work with DRUM! and the show’s upcoming two-week tour of the U.S. before a return to the Maritimes with performances at Pictou’s deCoste Centre on Nov. 24 and Glace Bay’s Savoy Theatre on Nov. 25, Squid is busy giving motivational speeches at schools.

“We talk about what we learned from drumming that can be applied to school sports or other activities and the response has been great,” says St. Pierre. “And when we tell them they should practise, it’s not like a 40-year-old telling them, we’re more on their level. We’re booking as many school shows as we can.”