Arts Roundup
April 16, 2026

Music

• Guitarist and singer Raul Midón, as well as indie-soul band Shebad, will join Hiromi's Sonicwonder as headliners of the Edmonton International Jazz Festival, which takes place from June 19 to 28.
• Seeka Sings, an Edmonton-based children's artist and educator, spoke to CKUA about receiving the 2025 Edmonton Artists' Trust Fund award from the Edmonton Arts Council and the Edmonton Community Foundation.
• New Music Edmonton's The No Normal podcast featured composer and educator Matthias McIntire, who has been teaching at Dalhousie University and touring his multimedia songcycle Sing Nature Alive internationally. His composition The Forest Reclaims the Land will be performed by the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra on April 24.
• CKUA has issued a warning after members of Alberta's arts and music communities received fraudulent emails impersonating CKUA hosts and requesting payment for interviews and promotion.

Visual arts

• Chef Chris Hrynyk of Continental Treat Fine Bistro is showing his solo art exhibition, Intersectional Convergence, at St. Albert's Visual Arts Studio Association until May 2. Hrynyk's acrylic cityscape paintings depict urban scenes from Edmonton's Gibson Block to international cities like New York City and Bangkok.
• A new exhibit at Edmonton City Hall highlights student designs created to reduce textile waste through upcycling and reuse. The pieces come from 13 youth participants in the Reuse Centre's Sustainable Fashion Week workshop, which teaches sewing and design skills. Organizers say the initiative promotes practical ways to keep clothing out of landfills, as more than 39,000 tonnes of textiles were discarded between 2022 and 2024. The exhibit runs until April 27.

Theatre and dance

• Playwright and actor Beth Graham and dance veteran Brian Webb are set to perform separate but thematically linked spoken-word monologues at The Roxy from April 16 to 18. Their show sees each artist explore vulnerability and identity.
• Trunk Theatre will stage Jordan Harrison's Marjorie Prime at the Varscona Theatre through April 19. The play, which premiered 10 years ago, centres on an AI companion that shores up the fading memory of an 85-year-old woman. Director Amy DeFelice told 12th Night the play has never felt more relevant: "The technology has caught up."
• The Stage Struck! festival of one-act plays runs April 17 and 18 at the Gateway Theatre, featuring seven new works from local playwrights and two previously produced works.
• Members of Edmonton's dance community and the Alberta Dance Alliance are launching Dance Lives Here, a new marketing initiative, that will see a free lunchtime event at Edmonton's city hall on April 29, which is International Dance Day. Edmonton has 13 professional dance companies, 48 semi-professional dance groups, 43 independent dance artists, and more than 6,100 youth training in dance.

Books and publishing

• The Writers' Guild of Alberta has announced the shortlists for the 2026 Alberta Literary Awards, with winners to be announced on June 5 in Edmonton. Shortlisted authors include Tim Bowling, reuben quinn, Richard Van Camp, Conor Kerr, Beth Graham, Karen Hines, Jennifer Bowering Delisle, and Jason Purcell. The Golden Pen Award will be presented to Caterina Edwards for lifetime achievement.
• The Coalition of Alberta Public Libraries is urging Albertans to speak up against proposed legislation that would limit access to some books. "It is censorship," Pilar Martinez of the Edmonton Public Library said of Bill 28, which would restrict access to books deemed to contain graphic sexual content.
• Marty Chan, an Edmonton playwright, documentary-maker, and children's author, discussed growing up Chinese-Canadian, book bans, and Bill 28 in the latest episode of the Alberta Unbound podcast by Sen. Paula Simons.
• Bailey Books in St. Albert has found new life under Lisa Bailey, who transformed her father's quiet online used-book shop into a community hub, in part by capitalizing on the BookTok boom in romance and fantasy titles. In-store sales grew 3,200% in the first year of retail operations, The Globe and Mail noted, and the store has won multiple St. Albert Chamber of Commerce awards.
• Poet laureate Medgine Mathurin performed her poem Still in Edmonton in a spoken word video.
• Laurence Miall published two interviews: one with Métis geoscientist Keith Diakiw of Talking Rock Tours, who discusses Edmonton's 11,000 years of history hiding in plain sight; and one with Wendy McGrath, who reflects on the city's working-class northeast and argues working-class voices have not been heard in Canada.
• kiskisomitok ᑭᐢᑭᓱᒥᑐᐠ by reuben quinn was among the top-selling non-fiction books on the Edmonton bestseller list from the Book Publishers Association of Alberta.
• Project Adult Literacy Society has launched an inaugural young adult cohort, offering reading, writing, and math training to peopled aged 18 to 25. Executive director Monica Das said learners who don't receive adequate support can hit a wall that deters them from learning."There are quite a few learners who might fall behind and need that extra support," she told CBC Edmonton's Radio Active. "This can lead to frustration, low self-esteem, lack of confidence, and eventually dropping out of school."

Screen industries

• The Dreamspeakers International Indigenous Film Festival returns to Edmonton until April 19, showcasing more than 30 films, workshops, and an artisan market. One of the world's longest-running Indigenous film festivals, it opens with a free screening of Nika & Madison at Metro Cinema. A new version of late Métis filmmaker Gil Cardinal's 1987 documentary Foster Child — which explores his search for his biological family in Edmonton — screens at the festival with newly added Cree syllabic subtitles.
• The Good Game YEG podcast looked back on the first quarter in Alberta's game industry, with highlights including Sovereign Syndicate from Crimson Herring Studios landing on Xbox and PlayStation, and Caldera Interactive launching a demo for The Rabbit Haul on Steam.

More headlines

• Finalists are posted for the Edmonton Tourism Awards, which will be presented on June 5 at the Edmonton EXPO Centre. The Canadian Finals Rodeo, Rockin' Thunder, and The Great Outdoors Comedy Festival are nominated for the destination event of the year award. DARK at Fort Edmonton Park, Deep Freeze: A Byzantine Winter Festival, and Flying Canoë Volant are nominated for the fall/winter festival of the year, while the Edmonton Folk Music Festival, Edmonton International Fringe Theatre Festival, and Cariwest are up for spring/summer festival of the year.
• The Dr. Woods House Museum in Leduc will reopen on a limited seasonal basis this summer, after being closed while staff catalogued and preserved the collection.
• Members of the University of the Philippines Alumni Association Edmonton have launched an anti-racism project called Sama-Sama: our stories, our visions. Sama-Sama brings together voices from Alberta's Filipino community, exploring migration, identity, and discrimination through art and short video reels. "Our stories are important," Ryan Lacanilao told CBC Edmonton's Radio Active. "The stories of people who are newcomers here, the stories of people who are racialized and their experiences here — they were able to tell the stories on their own terms." The art is up until April 30 at the Mill Woods branch of Edmonton Public Library, which will also host a video launch on April 19.
• Creatives Empowered is calling for six IBPOC content creators from Edmonton and the surrounding area to produce one- to three-minute anti-racism videos. Each creator selected will receive $4,500, a $1,000 production credit from FAVA, and a free first-year FAVA membership. The deadline to apply is May 1.

Happenings

Here are some events coming up over the next seven days:

• April 16: Book Launch with John Barton starting at 7pm at Audreys Books
• April 16-18: Tiny House Concert Series at John Walter Museum
• April 17-19: The Ukrainian Film Festival at Garneau Theatre
• April 17: Chorealis Cabaret starting at 7pm at Unitarian Church of Edmonton
• April 18: Pawcasso & Art Sale starting at 11am at Humane Animal Rescue Team
• April 18: The Art of Consent: A Watercolour Experience starting at 1pm at Arcadia Brewing Co.
• April 18-19: Wholly Handmade at Strathcona County Community Centre
• April 19: Producer Lab: Pitching starting at 12pm at Fringe Theatre Arts Barns
• April 19: Sama-Sama Video Launch and Art Exhibit on Anti-Racism starting at 2pm at Edmonton Public Library (Millwoods)
• Until April 19: Dreamspeakers International Film Festival
• April 20: Reading Between the Barcode Lines starting at 5pm at Magpie Books
• April 20: The Sheepdogs - Out All Night Tour starting at 8pm at Winspear Centre

And here are some upcoming events to keep in mind:

• April 28: Literary Editions 2026 at University of Alberta (Rutherford Library South)
• April 30-May 3: Jabulani Arts Festival at Roxy Theatre
• May 4: 2026 Edmonton Arts Prize Presentation at Garneau Theatre

Visit the Taproot Edmonton Calendar for many more events in the Edmonton region.