Emotional Devastation, Perfectly Delivered: Leith Ross at the Bella Concert Hall in Calgary, AB
Leith Ross at Calgary Folk Festival in 2024. Photo credit Dianne Miranda.
Imagine being in a room with your ex(es) while the songs you used to fall apart to are being sung back at you, only now the room is also filled with every relationship you’ve ever had: current talking stage, past dates, really just the quiet archive of queer people you’ve briefly known. That’s the specific kind of emotional torture that only a Leith Ross concert can provide. And this is what I had to emotionally endure (and more) on the Friday, April 24 evening at the Bella Concert Hall.
The Calgary date marked the fifth stop on their Canadian tour for their newest album, I Can See the Future, following shows in British Columbia and Edmonton. This was preceded by the United Kingdom and Europe legs of the tour in February and March earlier this year.
Before Leith Ross took the stage and before the emotional collapse I experienced, Calgary-based Nêhiyaw Cree singer-songwriter Wyatt C. Louis gently eased the room and played the sweetest harmonies. Taking centre stage with only their acoustic guitar in hand and their warm voice, Louis did what the best openers do: made you forget, in the briefest moment you shared, that the main act had yet to begin. By the time they ended their last song, I had pulled out my phone to follow them on every social media platform and streaming service for the next opportunity to see them live again.
I’ve seen Leith Ross play live in Calgary twice before this, opening for Bahamas back in April 2024 and during 2024 Calgary Folk Music Festival. By now, I knew what their presence could do to a room: have you laughing at their banter and soft humour before opening up the floodgates of tears through their most devastating songs.
They open their set with “Point of View” offering this lightness and as I turn to those who joined me this night, friends and my sibling, I’m reminded that I’m exactly where I need to be as they sing, “I’m too aware that I’m dying, You show me that I’m alive.” That sense of grounding in my community continues into “Stay,” one of my favourites from the album (if I can continue saying this about each song they play).
There is a certain humility, honesty and bareness to Leith Ross and their band that is reflected in the simplicity and ease of their performance. This show felt almost as if a group of good friends were playing a house show translated into a concert hall: intimate without being imposing, bare without ever feeling sparse. There was no need for grand theatrics. Instead, the lighting was subtle and intentional and the Bella Concert Hall itself feels like the most ideal setting for a seated audience.
As much as I love the recorded songs, there is something about hearing them reimagined in real time that makes them unfamiliar while still staying true to those Leith Ross sounds in the best way. One of the most striking moments for me comes with “What My Love Is For,” which they performed in a stripped-back, almost jazz-inflected arrangement that shifts the song’s emotional texture entirely and I find myself swaying with this love song.
The next two songs offer a striking contrast whether it’s “I Love Watching You Eat Dinner” with the disarmingly ordinary title but is actually about finding grandeur in the seemingly smallest and unremarkable gestures of love, or it’s the upbeat rhythm with a hopeful bassline contrasting to lyrics of fear because of the uncertainty of life of “Terrified.”
Halfway through the night, guitarist Zoe Sparks, drummer Vania Lee, multi-instrumentalist Soona Lee-Tolley and keyboardist Keiran Placatka all stepped off stage, for a new song — that Ross had shared was only their second time playing live — “Baby.”
The next half of the show brought tears that I couldn’t stop as the band came back and played “I’d Have to Think About It,” “I Will,” “Grieving - Reprise” and “Grieving” all back to back. Even now writing this review and watching clips of recordings of the songs, I find myself crying again in a way that feels just as immediate as it did in the room. Ross also shared a little bit about what these songs mean to them and the stories behind them, grounding them in something deeply personal and intentional that they offered the audience. Throughout this group of songs, a violin also threads through the arrangements, soft but persistent.
After the stretch of some of the most emotionally heavy moments of the night, Ross slowly brings the energy back up with the hopeful title track, “I Can See The Future.” Here, there is a noticeable shift as the audience is invited to join in their imaginative future where “everything grows,” which ultimately is “all we need.”
By the end of the night, Ross even encourages, almost challenges, the audience to get up and dance to a Leith Ross song, which initially feels impossible, but slowly becomes inevitable as I look around and see the entire hall moving and singing along to “(You) On My Arm.”
This Canadian leg of the tour concludes in Ontario and Quebec, May 1 and 2, for those that want to experience this for themselves. This show has moved up to be my favourite live music experience I’ve seen and I don’t expect that to change anytime soon. Turns out, the emotional torture was more than worth it.