Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - February 2, 2021, Winnipeg, Manitoba C M Y K PAGE C1 T HE oft-referenced early pandemic phrase “nature is healing” took on a differ- ent meaning for Kevin Kratsch last spring. For three months straight, the Manitoba musician and photogra- pher, who goes by the moniker Mister K, spent every morning holed up in a makeshift blind, waiting to catch a glimpse of the fox family denning in his yard. It was far from the first time he had seen foxes on his property north of Lorette, but their presence was a welcome slice of calm amid the unfolding global health crisis. “I would set my alarm for 6 a.m. and I’d go out with my coffee and my camera and go sit out in a pop-up ice- fishing shack I set up,” Kratsch says. “I was dealing with a lot of anxiety at the time, with the uncertainties of the music industry and the state of our world and whatnot. And… it was a meditation, really; it was a way of kind of just putting myself in a pres- ent moment, to lock into some nature and listen to myself.” He witnessed a lot of interesting fox behaviour while watching the eight pups grow into their own. During wood-tick season, there was some ner- vous hand-wringing when he noticed the pups were covered in the blood- sucking insects. “The next day I’m out there and the mom comes and… she pulls them off with her teeth,” he says. “The pups roll over and she starts picking all the little wood ticks off and just spitting them out. It’s pretty neat.” Kratsch gained a fondness for one pup, in particular. The fox, which he nicknamed Lil’ Kev Kev, was the most adventurous of the bunch and had a strange habit of hanging out by him- self in the nearby woodpile. “He had dragged some food over there, so he’d have his own little stash,” says Kratsch, a self-described competi- tive middle child. “I’m, like, six-foot- five and I had an appetite as a kid and I used to stash food and stuff, and I was like, ‘This guy is kind of like me; he’s just trying to survive.’” It was a bittersweet moment when the crew left the den for good, but sharing the foxes with others has given the project another purpose. Kratsch has been turning his fox photos and footage into calendars and music vid- eos to accompany the release of his de- but album, In Event of Moon Disaster. The video for his single Harmony, an uplifting pop ballad, is a montage of curious young foxes romping and wrestling through the woods — he also plans to release a 40-minute fire log-esque fox video of the full album on YouTube. “The overall theme of the record is harmony and… finding hope on darker days,” he says. “The fox has kind of represented to me a bit of healing and a bit of solace or a calming presence. I’m hoping I can share that.” Kratsch previously performed as Kevin Roy until two years ago, when he became disillusioned with the direc- tion his career was heading. He started writing new, more vulnerable material about his struggles with mental health and rebranded as Mister K, an homage to his day job as a high school shops teacher. “It’s a way of me almost getting more in touch with my identity and something that I’ve been kind of stray- ing from,” he says. He teamed up with producer Rusty Matyas to record In Event of Moon Disaster — the name a reference to then-U.S. president Richard Nixon’s al- ternative 1969 moon-landing speech — in 2019 and held off on its release when the COVID-19 pandemic hit Manitoba. The delay was a blessing in disguise. “It’s more fitting now than it was two years ago,” Kratsch says. “This (album) is all about trying to bring people together and… bring a little bit of unity to this world; it’s getting pretty divided.” In Event of Moon Disaster launches today and Kratsch will present a free virtual concert and Q&A session, moderated by Matyas, Friday at 8 p.m. The event is presented by the Killar- ney-Turtle Mountain Arts Council and will be livestreamed at facebook.com/ heyheymisterk. eva.wasney@freepress.mb.ca Twitter: @evawasney ARTS ●LIFE ARTS@FREEPRESS.MB.CA ● WINNIPEGFREEPRESS.COM TUESDAY FEBRUARY 2, 2021 CONNECT WITH THE BEST ARTS AND LIFE COVERAGE IN MANITOBA SECTION C▼ Tony Bennett has been secretly battling Alzheimer’s TONY Bennett has been quietly hiding his Alzheimer’s disease for four years. The 94-year-old Queens, New York-born crooner was diagnosed in 2016 and has been continuing to work through his symptoms, AARP Maga- zine reported Monday. Bennett’s wife, Susan, said his family decided to come forward with his diag- nosis without his input because he is no longer able to make such decisions. “He would ask me, ‘What is Alzheim- er’s?’ ” she told the magazine. “I would explain, but he wouldn’t get it. He’d tell me, ‘Susan, I feel fine.’ That’s all he could process — that physically he felt great. So, nothing changed in his life. Anything that did change, he wasn’t aware of.” His wife and one of his sons, Danny, have essentially taken over for him, taking care of the day-to-day opera- tions and keeping Bennett as comfort- able as possible. In mid-January, he received the first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. Bennett’s musical career dates back seven decades: his first hit, Because of You, was released in 1951, five years after he returned from fighting in the Second World War. His fame catapult- ed in the early 1980s after a near-fatal drug overdose and several poorly sell- ing albums. The raspy-voiced musician has recently worked with Lady Gaga, with the pair releasing their Cheek to Cheek album in 2014 with a sequel resched- uled to this spring. Cheek to Cheek was named best traditional pop vocal album at the 2015 Grammys and the two performed live onstage together. Two singles, Anything Goes and I Can’t Give You Anything but Love, were met with critical acclaim. Gaga, another New Yorker, knew about Bennett’s condition, according to AARP, and helped carry him through interviews and the documentary. Symptoms of Alzheimer’s can in- clude serious memory loss, confusion, disorientation, mood and behaviour changes, unfounded suspicions about family, friends and professional care- givers, and difficulty speaking, swal- lowing and walking, according to the Alzheimer’s Association. But Bennett’s family said he hasn’t experienced disorientation yet or exhibited “the episodes of terror, rage or depression.” “Life is a gift — even with Alzheim- er’s,” Bennett tweeted Monday morn- ing after the story broke. The I Left My Heart In San Francis- co singer has 18 Grammy wins and 36 nominations to his name, beginning in 1962 with record of the year and best male solo vocal performance. In 2001, he was honoured with a Recording Academy Lifetime Achieve- ment Award. Bennett’s most recent show, a March concert in Red Bank, N.J., was almost immediately followed by the COVID-19 shutdown, but the singer still performs at home, two 90-minute sets a week with his longtime pianist Lee Musiker at the suggestion of his neurologist “to keep him on his toes,” according to AARP. He can still run through his old classics with the best of them: Maybe This Time, Boulevard of Broken Dreams, Fly Me to the Moon. “Singing is everything to him,” his wife said. “Everything. It has saved his life many times. Many times. Through divorces and things. If he ever stops singing, that’s when we’ll know.” — New York Daily News KATE FELDMAN EVAN AGOSTINI / INVISION FILES Singer Tony Bennett, 94, last did a live show in March 2020, just before COVID-19 hit. EVA WASNEY A farewell to foxes Musician, photographer found inner peace, inspiration early in pandemic by surreptitiously observing crafty critters cavorting in his yard VIRTUAL CONCERT PREVIEW Mister K, In Event of Moon Disaster album launch Friday, 8 p.m. Free livestream and Q&A at facebook.com/heyheymisterk KEVIN KRATSCH PHOTO The foxes in Kevin Kratsch’s yard near Lorette provided endless entertainment, but also inspiration for Kratsch (top left) and his latest album, In Event of Moon Disaster. KEVIN KRATSCH PHOTO C_01_Feb-02-21_FP_01.indd C1 2021-02-01 4:42 PM ;