Sat 02/05/2026 - 18:00 - Music Mania Instore Session: Emilie Mover
Born in Montreal and raised in the jazz clubs of Toronto, Europe, and New York City, I’ve lived a life saturated in sound. As the daughter of bebop saxophonist, Bob Mover, my childhood was spent perched on the edges of bandstands, hanging out during set breaks, and doing schoolwork on barstools. Blessed to have been often lulled to sleep by the echoes of the improvisational solos of some of the greatest musicians out there, I developed an early, dual fascination, bordering on obsession: First, an endless curiosity for all things musical; second, a keen, sociological interest in the people around me—the musicians, the owners, fans, and loyalists—who gathered around the music.
AS AN Artist
I started singing jazz standards with my dad professionally when I was 13, and released my first album of original songs five years later. Since then, I’ve been fortunate to have built an international following. Though I resist defining myself by genre by the very grit of my teeth, the songs I write can, and have, been described as understated and lyrically based in style, spanning pop, country, dream-folk, and traditional jazz. Over the last decade and a half, I’ve released nine studio albums. In 2013 I won a Juno Award (a Canadian Grammy). My songs have become a staple of the sync world, and have been featured in everything from HBO’s Girls to major campaigns for Amazon and Pandora. Whether I’m composing for film or television, writing kids’ songs, or digging into my very soul, crafting an album from the bottom of my heart, I like to think I approach music the same way I approach people: with love and humility, vulnerability and authenticity, with a sense of humor, and without judgment. Writing, playing, and singing songs to audiences big and small will forever remain my true love.
AS A PhilosophER
While my roots are firmly planted in the realm of performance, stemming from the bebop halls of Parker, Rollins, Baker, and Holiday (among others) to the songwriting of my fellow Canadians, legends Cohen, Mitchell and Young, my obsession with music eventually transcended genre. This began a lifelong, analytical study of song that evolved into Synchrony—a structured framework that views 20th-century music not as a timeline, but as a cosmic network in direct symmetry with the human experience. Raised as I was, steeped in not only the music but the philosophy and worldview that many of my father’s contemporaries shared, I naturally came to observe the nature and laws of music as being in direct symmetry with life itself. Over the years, this philosophy has resulted in a kind of synthesis of musicology and the broader patterns of history and psychology. This way of looking at the world came to infiltrate all else, ultimately broadening my career and acting as a root for my other musical endeavours.
AS A Speaker & Educator
Today, these passions have converged into a multi-disciplinary methodology. Alongside continuing my performance career, I have branched out into delivering songwriting workshops and speaking engagements that explore music as our civilization’s "source code." Rooted in my 2024 radio special, Synchrony, these methods of exploring music move beyond performance and into the realm of sociology. I invite audiences to see the music of the last century as a living map—a reflection of our collective emotional intelligence and the profound, logical interconnectedness of the lives we lead.
I am currently dividing my time between New York, Toronto, and Brussels.