PEDAL MEMORY: A JOURNEY HOME THROUGH MEMORY To Premiere In Toronto This April

Percussionist and multimedia artist Thomas Li will present PEDAL MEMORY: A Journey Home Through Memory, a one-night-only theatrical percussion concert on April 4 at That Arts Group Black Box Theatre in Toronto.

The program will feature music by composer Fish Yu and the world premiere of Li’s multimedia work Pedal Memory, bringing together percussion, live video, and sound design in an immersive concert format. Organized as a double bill, the evening will explore themes of memory, migration, and cultural identity through experimental performance.

Opening the program is Yu’s Three Bagel-tales of DAIWAN, a surreal triptych that blends percussion, electronics, visual projection, and theatrical elements. Inspired by the structure of classical bagatelles, the work reflects on the experience of leaving home, balancing humor with reflections on cultural change and protest.

The evening concludes with the premiere of Pedal Memory, a 30-minute solo work for modified bicycle, percussion, and live multimedia design by Li, with sound design by Tim Roth. Inspired by Li’s childhood bicycle rides along Hong Kong’s Shing Mun River and through the Sha Tin district, the piece transforms pedaling, braking, and balance into musical gestures. Archival footage, Google Street View imagery, and live-generated video combine to recreate fragments of a neighborhood shaped by time and distance.

“These pieces exist somewhere that isn't fully remembered but isn't entirely imagined,” said Li. “We can't recreate what has happened, but we can search for the feeling of past times and places.”

According to the 2016 Canadian census, more than 215,000 Canadians were born in Hong Kong. Li’s project reflects on the experience of leaving home while exploring how cultural memory persists within diasporic communities.