Joel Quarrington

The bassist’s great triumph isn’t the Juno he just won, or even moonlighting with the LSO

I’ve heard a lot of live music in the past month, but what sticks in my head is several minutes from a casual afternoon benefit concert at the National Arts Centre on Sunday. First bassist Joel Quarrington and cellist Carole Sirois played some Rossini, and then they joined violinists Jessica Linnebach and Yosuke Kawasaki for some more Rossini. (There was other stuff in between.) What stood out was Quarrington, a big guy who plays what is normally regarded as an ungainly instrument, the string bass.