Calgary singer-songwriter Jolene Marie has an inner world like a deciduous forest. Her patient, shadowy songs explore the intertwining of desire and despair; hope is found both in the wisdom of running rivers and in the tenderness of hands meeting. Inspired by outsider folk hero Sibylle Baier, Jolene Marie’s folk songs mix simplicity with rawness; and like Baier, Jolene Marie’s work feels like a woman diving deep on her lonesome, unafraid to share what she’s found. Jolene Marie’s songs unlock the clarity of grief. Her voice—gritty with emotion, or soaring as a revelation—speaks to how we’re all falling apart, and falling together, all the time. And all the while holding on, as she sings it, “to the hand of impermanence.” -Sam Boer