Brewing up a Good Time
We met Church Key Brewery owner John Graham this past summer at the Port Hope Estival and hit it off right away. His whole approach to local produce and community involvement was very much in keeping with our philosophy and we agreed to try to pull together some events in his town of Campbellford. Well, it didn't take long!
We started the day yesterday with a visit to Hillcrest Public School where I did my presentation for most of the school and then handed Voyageur over to student John Francis and to local favourite Andrew Queen. As we were getting acquainted, I kept thinking Andrew looked familiar. Sure enough, he was a member of the iconic Canadian jugband, Jughead, with whom I'd worked a bunch of times in the early '90's at Harbourfront Centre.
From there, it was off to CKOL Radio 93.7. The station is in a tiny house on a Campbellford residential street where Dave Lockwood runs it pretty much as a community service. All the DJ's are volunteers and Cliff was our host as Ken Layton and Ken Tizzard came in to play a couple of songs and invite people to the book store and the pub later in the day.
From there we stopped briefly at the Stinking Rose for a delicious soup and sandwich before making our way to Kerr's Corner Bookstore for a signing session. Special thanks to customers Rob and Dave who really hit home for me how it is that people hold the story of Voyageur each for themselves.
It all culminated in a terrific evening at John's pub, The Stinking Rose. Lots of folks from the community came out to see and play the guitar and we loosely structured it as an evening of songs and stories. We heard everything from originals to Beatles sing-a-longs and the requisite Canadian classics. As much as I love seeing Voyageur played on the big stage, seeing and hearing it embraced by a community in an intimate setting like this is really the heart and soul of the project. You can see pictures from the evening here.
Special thanks to John Graham, Mary Lou Wright, Dave and Rosemary Kerr, our hosts at the Water's Edge Inn and to everyone in the community who came out to meet the Nation.
Posted at 11:59 AM
Open Door Policy
My friend and Tall Poppy Prez Laura Weatherbie put Marysia and Sharon in touch with me as they organized this year's annual Open Door Festival of Music – a benefit concert for the Red Door Family Shelter. I would have been happy to help anyway but it was a total bonus that the lineup was stellar and included many who were already friends of the Nation, including Ember Swift, Chris Whitely and Adam Solomon.
Lindy Vopnfjord of Major Maker is a very special friend of the project. I've been a fan of his for a long time and the lucky stone inlaid into the 7th fret is there partly in tribute to him. Lindy and the lucky stone both hail from Gimli Manitoba, home of the famous Gimli Glider, Crown Royal Whiskey AND the largest Icelandic population outside of Iceland. One look at blonde, 6'8" Lindy and you figure he'd make a good Viking. That's why it looks like he's holding a ukelele in this picture! Now, this particular Viking has played Voyageur before but never in public.
I got a chance to properly introduce Voyageur with a short multimedia presentation and then hand it off to Lindy, who proceeded to sing a song written for his home town of Gimli. What a total treat from that gentlest of giants!
Thanks to Sharon Ross, Marysia Czarski, Laura Weatherbie and Lindy Vopnfjord.
Photo by Sharon Ross.
Posted at 11:31 PM