JIM HILLMAN

JIM HILLMAN
After my glory years at Queenston I attended River Heights, then Kelvin. Week-ends were spent avoiding girls (too shy) by playing drums in garage bands. A year and a half at the University of Manitoba in Arts (I thought I was heading for Law School) was all I could handle. I dropped out, drifted, then stumbled into a gig with a local bar band.

I dug the lifestyle and the people, and managed to play decent drums. It turned out to be my profession – I’ve been playing drums professionally ever since. In ’75 I became disenchanted with my future in the Winnipeg bar scene, again drifted, again stumbled – this time into the world of jazz and latin music in Montreal. The city has treated me well over the years. I’ve been blessed with a successful career and have travelled extensively, playing good music of which few of my Queenston classmates will ever have heard.

Managed to conquer my shyness too. Celine and I have been together 19 years; her daughter Katia was 6 when we began our relationship, and in November gave birth to Mathilde, who is delightful. So life has been good to me. Outside of playing music, I enjoy cooking and languages.

I formed a contemporary jazz vocal group called The Merlin Factor in the 80s; the group has managed to continue over the years, performing sporadically where-ever we are able. Besides playing drums and arranging the group’s music, I write the lyrics for our repertoire, in collaboration with diverse composers. This spring we will release our 4th CD.

In ’96 Celine and I decided to investigate music scenes elsewhere, and left Montreal, living for one year in New York and three in Toronto before returning. The quality of life in Montreal is higher then the two larger cities, and my professional connections here make an already difficult professional milieu a little easier. So we are happy to be back. The future? Tough business to predict; fortunately – or perhaps not – these days everybody else seems to be increasingly in the same boat.