Patchwork: Modular Worldmaking, Presented by Polaris Music Prize

Free Salon, w/Registration | Sep 7, 1-4 PM | Responsive Ecologies Lab (RELab) at TMU, Toronto
All Ages | Accessible Venue | Salon (Participants should bring wired headphones)

In celebration of 20 years of Polaris Music Prize, we’ve created the Polaris Festival presented by Sirius XM Canada. The Festival is happening throughout September with over 15 events like Salons, Concerts, Listening Sessions, and our Concert & Award Ceremony at Massey Hall. Browse Festival events here.

Register Free to Reserve Your Spot

Food provided by Palestinian Bakeshop.

Patchwork is a hands-on workshop series organized by Katie Stelmanis (Austra – past Polaris nominee) that aims to create an unintimidating space for learning about modular synthesis. While synth communities are often dominated by white cis-masculine norms, Patchwork expands the possibilities of who can participate in this form of music-making by centering women, 2SLGBTQ+ and/or racialized people who may or may not have any experience with noise-making electronics.

Similar workshops have been hosted at The Responsive Ecologies Lab (RE/Lab). This TMU research facility works in close collaboration with YorkU’s Designing Sound Futures (DSF), a research project focused on sound, technology, inclusive design and transdisciplinary learning. In collaboration with Casey Mecija (Ohbijou), a musician, associate professor and research associate with RE/Lab and DSF, Patchwork for Polaris invites the public to learn more about modular synthesis, interact with equipment, and learn from four artists working with the form. The event will feature an introduction to modular synthesis led by Heidi Chan.

About Katie Stelmanis, Austra, Previous Polaris Nominee

Katie Austra Stelmanis is an award winning composer, electronic music producer and singer best known for her work as Austra, a melodic-pop project with four albums and almost two decades of touring under her belt. Austra has earned Juno and Polaris nominations as well as multiple accolades including New York Magazine’s “Album of the Year” for her debut. Her upcoming fifth record will be released at the end of 2025 on Domino Records.

Recently, Stelmanis has been revisiting her classical background through scoring for film and television, earning a Canadian Screen Award for her work on the critically acclaimed docuseries and feature film, Swan Song (CBC, Dogwoof).

Dr. Casey Mecija, Ohbijou

Casey Mecija is an accomplished multidisciplinary artist, primarily working in music and film. She played in Ohbijou, the Canadian orchestral pop band, and released a solo album, Psychic Materials, in 2016. Mecija is also an award-winning filmmaker whose work has been screened internationally. She is an Associate Professor at York University in the Department of Communication and Media Studies, where she researches sound, art, and media as they relate to queer diaspora.

Heidi Chan

Heidi Chan was born in Canada to parents from Hong Kong, and currently works as a music performer, composer, sound designer, and digital music technology researcher. Heidi plays bamboo flutes, percussion, and modular synthesizer, and is a member of Japanese folk music ensemble ten ten. Heidi also collaborates frequently with cross-cultural and experimental music collectives, and has performed at various music festivals and performance series in Toronto. Heidi is completing her Ph.D. dissertation on the impact of early digital sampling technologies on the popularization of world music in the 80s and 90s. She teaches music and sound design at Toronto Metropolitan University and Humber College.

Korea Town Acid

Korea Town Acid is a multidisciplinary electronic artist, producer, live performer, DJ, curator, and educator, originally from Seoul, South Korea and now based in Toronto. Drawing on a rich background that spans classical piano training to underground club culture, she creates a genre-fluid sound that merges experimental club, hip-hop, breakbeat, jungle, and cinematic textures. Her work is defined by boundary-pushing production, intricate rhythmic layering, —crafting immersive sonic experiences that challenge convention and expand the possibilities of modern electronic music.

Erin Corbett

Erin Corbett is a musician, animator, and game designer from Kenora Ontario. Her focus on the intersection of sound design and songwriting has developed into an explosive approach to live performance. By blending modular synthesis with electric & acoustic instrumentation, Erin constructs dynamic, colourful, and partially-improvised soundscapes to explore themes of alienation, 21st century decay, and queer/transgender euphoria. In Fall of 2025 she will be releasing her fifth full-length album titled “The Tree, The Rot, The Bloom.

Aida Khorsandi

Aida Khorsandi is a composer-performer, sound synthesist, researcher, and educator whose approach to musicking emphasizes experimentation, embracing chaos and unpredictability, unlearning conventions, and decolonizing auditory hierarchies in musical practice. Aida uses displaced sound objects, as well as repetitive, erratic, and granular sonic and physical gestures, to create an ever-shifting sonic scene of ambient noise.

Currently pursuing a PhD at York University, Aida’s research explores the intersection of instrument design, interactivity, physical and sonic gesture, and haptic engagement. Aida’s work focuses on developing new technologies that enhance human interaction and embodied participation in music-making, fostering shared agency with computational systems.

Aida is investigating the expressivity and accessibility of new musical instruments through workshopping with different tactile and gestural interfaces.

DAPH

Daphne Zoe Dahlia / DAPH (She/Her) has been performing, composing, recording, producing, and mentoring artists for 20+ years. In 2017, she founded Copper Sound, a boutique recording studio in Guelph, ON, Canada. It serves as home base for her collaborations with artists locally and around the world. Daph’s work also includes musical directing for improv comedy, audio mixing for commercials, composing for film, voice over work, album art, photography, and website design. Daphne has been making new queer centred electronic music under the artist name DAPH. Her new direction combines deep vocals on top of hardware synths and samplers, bringing together elements of synth pop, house, hip hop, and darkwave. www.daphtone.com

Responsive Ecologies Lab (Re/Lab)

The Re/Lab is a unique transdisciplinary collaborative research facility at Toronto Metropolitan. Re/Lab director Professor Jason Nolan hosts many workshops and events supporting and promoting inclusive community-music practice and research, and works with his team to develop custom and adaptive tools and instruments for musicians disabled by existing practices and communities.

Designing Sound Futures (DSF) 

Designing Sound Futures (DSF) brings together a transdisciplinary York University research team, community-based partners, industry partners, and academic partners to challenge exclusionary boundaries in music education, the arts, and culture. Designing Sound Futures is supported by a York University Catalyzing Interdisciplinary Clusters (CIRC) grant and brings together researchers from the Faculty of Education, Humanities (LA&PS), the Lassonde School of Engineering, and Communication and Culture.

Polaris Music Prize

Polaris Music Prize is a Canadian charitable arts organization celebrating 20 years of honouring music as art. From June to September 2025, the new Polaris Music Prize Festival brings concerts, salons, and listening sessions to Toronto and across Ontario — culminating in the Polaris Concert & Award Ceremony on September 16 at Massey Hall. Through its Album, Song, and Heritage Prizes, Polaris amplifies Canadian artists based on artistic merit — not genre, sales, or algorithmic popularity. With 700+ artists championed, over $1.4M in prize and artist fees awarded, and a jury of over 200 music critics and curators, Polaris protects space for boundary-pushing music and fosters a deeper national music culture. Learn more at polarismusicprize.ca.

The event is part of the Polaris Music Prize Festival presented by SiriusXM Canada. CBC presents the 2025 Polaris Music Prize. This project is funded in part by FACTOR, the Government of Canada, and Canada’s private radio broadcasters. It is supported by SiriusXM Canada, Ontario Creates, the Government of Ontario, the Ontario Cultural Attractions Fund, and the Slaight Family Foundation.