It had to have been “destiny” that brought Girls With Glasses to the Music On McLean stage last week. In October, just before Thanksgiving, my far better half and I were moving our son to Da Big Smoke (Tranna) and, while at Hugh’s Room ran into Karyn Ellis of said group who I’d met at the Ontario Council of Folk Festival (OCFF) Conference back in 2003 in Sudbury. When she heard we were doing house concerts she said we needed to book their group and we said we’d consider. Later in the month, while at 2006 OCFF Conference in Ottawa, Sue ran into Evelyn Parry of the same group who saw Sue’s name tag with House Concerts on it and asked where we hosted these. When Perth was mentioned, her response was that her partner’s parents lived in Perth and when we asked who, incredibly she mentioned the mother being the woman we’d bought our house from @ 20 years ago, so her partner had grown up in our house. Like I said, “destiny”.
Girls With Glasses are Eve Goldberg, Karyn Ellis, Evalyn Parry & Allison Brown, all bespectacled singer / songwriters and solo performers in their own right who rarely gather together to perform together in this workshop type style. Each took turns propelling us to their desired destination, whether into our heads as Evalyn demanded with her wonderful rant on bottled water, or deep into our hearts as Eve sent us through her historic blues renditions. Allison performed a wonderful version of Townes Van Zant’s Lefty & Pancho while Karyn quirky stories and tunes led us many places. Knowing one another’s work availed them being able to add pleasing harmonies to one another’s tunes. Attendee’s enjoyed the sing along sections too. I shared a rant of my own challenging those there to write CBC to tell them we need to be able to hear wonderful, homegrown music like this all the time on our radios. A great evening by some wonderful musicians.
A week ago friends,Steve and Donna, kindly offered us tickets to see Ian Tamblyn in Almonte so we enjoyed a great show at the Old Town Hall there, as part of the Folkus Series. I hadn’t heard Ian since Barrie Folk Festival in November last year, when he was just heading out west on a Fall Tour. Well, he had lots of stories from that trip and other adventures he’s been on as Canada’s own world travellin’ troubadour. His gift of story telling continued in the wonderful tunes he performed, backed ably by Fred Guignion on guitars and lap steel and a solid bass line by a forgotten named player. From the Great Lakes to Antartica, his tunes took us through historic voyages, often initially created from people he’d met or coincidences he’s noted. Imagine being in a motorized inflated raft off the west coast and suddenly being surrounded by over 300 Minky whales and having them perform for you for 5 hours. This was just but one of Ian’s wonderful stories. Always a pleasing performer who never ceases to entertain. Josh Moran opened with his own tunes of experiences realized. Another good evening of tunes. Thanks Steve and Donna.
Music On McLean is looking forward to the return of the wonderful acoustic blues of Doug Cox and Sam Hurrie on Saturday February 24th . CBC’s Saturday Night Blues played a half hour concert of theirs back in September and they were memorable when they were here last year. Call 613-267-7902 to reserve.
This weekend we’re heading to Toronto for Winterfolk, a unique 3 day FREE festival held in 5 different bar / restaurants along the Danforth. Check out http://www.abetterworld.ca/Schedule.htm for the times and line up.
Locally, on February 9th Elphin’s own guitar stylist, Joey Wright (Sarah Harmer, Jenny Whiteley, etc.) releases his latest cd, Jalopy at MERA. Jesse Zubot (Zubot & Dawson, Great Uncles of the Revolution) will be playin’ fiddle, Dan Whiteley will star on mandolin and Joe Phillips will play bass. Tickets are at Shadaowfax 613-267-6817 and at the door - $20.00. Call 613-278-0689 to reserve or check availability. www.blackhenmusic.com.
Folk Upstairs are hosting a concert on March 2nd at PDCI as a fundraiser for PDCI band trip to Nova Scotia. The group is Cadence, an amazing multiple Juno nominated quartet who sing a cappella style. You’ll love ‘em and let’s support our own local musicians.
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