Getting Along

Getting Along - A Pandemic Duet

"Hope you’ll be glad to know you’ve been nice to me in my dreams...”

Getting Along is as much short film as music video. 

This piece poignantly captures the fairly terrifying suspended animation of life for artists at the height of pandemic lockdown, but not without levity and hope. Isn't it remarkable that so many artists in that time responded to the question of how they were possibly going to keep making art under such conditions, by making more art?

The words: "A Pandemic Duet” may not officially be in the song title, but there’s no way around it - that’s what this song is. A conversation between two artists, rooted in that strange expanse when all of us, individually and together were grappling with the changing of seasons and the marching of time, while life as we knew it stood seemingly still.

Two artists, two people, getting closer before everything stopped, checking in on each other. "How are you getting along?" Asking even though they knew the answer.

City Mouse, Country Mouse, different views, same reality. Shipwrecked, landlocked. Exercising resourcefulness and industriousness in states of secret silent panic and creeping depression. "So much is happening standing still / What to do when it’s time that kills?” Looking for beauty in the most and least familiar location for touring musicians: Home.

Kathryn asked her friend, singer songwriter double-Juno-nominee Julian Taylor to hold up one side of the conversation in Getting Along, who brought his signature unaffected, genuine sensitivity to the song.

Julian Taylor is a Canadian singer-songwriter, with an Afro-Indigenous (West Indian and Mohawk) lineage. Formerly associated with the band Staggered Crossing, he has continued to record and perform as the leader of the eponymous Julian Taylor Band since Staggered Crossing's breakup in 2007. His songs have appeared in television series including Degrassi: The Next Generation, Elementary and Haven. Nominations: 2023 and 2021 Juno Awards, 2021 Polaris Music Prize long list, 2021 Canadian Folk Music Awards (English Songwriter of the Year), 2016 Black Canadian Awards, 2015 Indigenous Music Awards, 2014 Toronto Independent Music Awards. Winner: 2021 Canadian Folk Music Awards (Solo Artist of the Year).

Award-winning filmmaker / director Scott Dobson and producer / cinematographer Michael Wojewoda conspired to create a compelling video starring Kathryn and Julian, and some highly inventive pandemic sets, involving projections of live action over miniatures from City Hall.

Song producer Creighton Doane helped KR capture the iso-vibe, using her home demo ukulele performance as the starting point for the track.

Well respected by her peers as a voice worth capturing on 100+ albums of other artists and as a funny, full-hearted person to have around, Canadian artist Kathryn Rose was born into a Jewish family hailing from Romania, Belarus, and England. Over her 6 original album releases, the ex-actress / backup-singer-to-the-stars / singer-songwriter has received critical acclaim for her sexy-smart, funny-sad cinematic pop pen. Since her last solo album she has been raising her two kids on her own, running a touring company performing with symphonies across North America, teaching voice, collaborating with other artists, working as a session vocalist and voice actor, and getting back to her original music, releasing a song at a time.

"Getting Along" is a return to the collision of Kathryn Rose’s unique voice and world view. It’s nice to hear that voice again.

"Thinking of you on this blustery day / Checking in just to make sure you’re ok / We’re on the verge of Spring again, we were just becoming friends / Maybe we should write a song about getting along..."

Starring:
Kathryn Rose
Julian Taylor
Directed by Scott Dobson & Michael Wojewoda
Song by Kathryn Rose
Produced by Creighton Doane
Vocals • Kathryn Rose & Julian Taylor
Ukelele • Kathryn Rose
Drums, Piano • Creighton Doane

  • Kathryn Allison Rose
    Author
  • Kathryn Allison Rose
    Name of Band or Artist
  • Scott Dobson
    Director
  • Michael Phillip Wojewoda
    Director
  • Kathryn Allison Rose
    Writer
  • Kathryn Allison Rose
    Key Cast
    "Self"
  • Julian Taylor
    Key Cast
    "Self"
  • Scott Dobson
    Producer
    Fix and Release
  • Michael Phillip Wojewoda
    Producer
  • Kathryn Allison Rose
    Producer
  • Project Type:
    Music Video, Short
  • Genres:
    Pandemic, Duet, Pandemic duet, Art film, Short, Slice of life, Artists, Artist life, Ballad, Survival, Cities, Isolation, Friendship, Humanity, Creativity, Madness, Depression, Compassion
  • Runtime:
    5 minutes 17 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    March 10, 2023
  • Production Budget:
    0 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    Canada
  • Country of Filming:
    Canada
  • Language:
    English
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
Director Biography - Scott Dobson, Michael Phillip Wojewoda

Left to Right: SCOTT DOBSON, KATHRYN ROSE, & MICHAEL WOJEWODA, on the "Getting Along" set.

See below for short bios on SCOTT DOBSON & MICHAEL WOJEWODA.

** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **

SCOTT DOBSON

Scott Dobson has been telling award-winning stories for 30 years, as a producer, director, and story editor. 



Some of the stories Scott has told, in film:

• Meat;
• Knives;
• Beer;
• Elvis and his twin brother Jesse;
• SCTV;
• God;
• Puffins;
• World champion oyster shuckers;
• Bobby Taylor who produced the Jackson 5 and had Jimmy Hendrix in his band;
• Asian shepherds who will knock you down as a courtesy before they kill you;
• Turtle trauma surgery for the faint of heart;
• Blind First Nations folk who don't need treaties to be in Braille to know they are getting shafted;
• Tattoo legend Ed Hardy;
• The Blues;
• Hardcore nazi punks who have gone soft jazz;
• Millennials trying make a living;
• Terry Jones spam spam spam;
• BINGO;
• Wrestlers;
• Flying Asian carp invasions
.

Special skills: Oyster shucking.

** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **

MICHAEL WOJEWODA

I’m a Canadian-based record producer, mixer, composer, musician, filmmaker, editor, teacher, writer, world traveler and motorcycle journalist. I’ve been doing this work for that last 34 years. Weirdly, I still like it a lot.

Career Highlights:


• 2019 - Canadian Screen Award - Best Sound Non Fiction - Gord Downie’s “Secret Path, Live in Concert”;
• 2015 - Polaris Music Prize - Buffy Sainte-Marie’s "Power In The Blood" (Co-Producer and Mixer);
• 2009 - JUNO Award - Childrens’ Album Of The Year - Barenaked Ladies - “Snacktime” (Producer, Engineer, Mixer);
• 1998 - JUNO Award - Best Engineer - Spirit Of The West - “Faithlift”;
• 1996 - JUNO Award - Best Producer - Ashley McIsaac - “Hi How Are You Today”.

Add Director Biography
Director Statement

A City is made of a million me's and you's. Our intent was to explore the sense of space and place in a world shut down and desperate for connection. 



Rather than shoot a real City, we decided to use a model of one and project the song's protagonists upon it, as a way of seeing a City as a giant heart made up of a few million smaller hearts beating and yearning. We liked the semi-hyperrealism and diminished grandeur and impermanence of a painstakingly detailed miniature cardboard City. The emotion of Kathryn’s song came through, showing our two subjects sporadically communicating via technology, with physical distance, over time.



Projecting Kathryn and Julian onto the sides of buildings as if they were 40 stories high exposed the emotional contrast of pandemic isolation making our actual lives feel small and humble, and our futures uncertain. The model of the City was hand-built to give the City a homemade feeling that was organic and caring. The City and its struggles is a third living and breathing character in this story, and the time-lapse check-ins between our two humans/artists is one truthful story among stories.