This Week In Art/Culture/Entertainment
By John Swartz
Wednesday June 3 the Orillia Vocal Ensemble has a concert at St. Paul’s Centre at 7:30 p.m. As usual their concerts are fundraisers and this time its for the Orillia Museum of Art and History’s Young Creative Kits Project.
They don’t charge an admission fee, but collect donations just like on Sunday mornings.
The Orillia Silver Band’s last concert of the season (other than their turn at the Aqua Theater in the summer) is June 6 at 7 p.m. at St. Paul’s Centre. Bright Nights features music from the theater and dance music. They will perform Strauss’s Overture to Die Fledermaus and Overture to Raymond by French composer Ambroise Thomas.
The concert will also feature several soloists: Michael Fraser (euphonium) on Philip Sparke’s Harlequin, Jonas Feldman (cornet) on William Himes’s Jubilance, and Rita Arendz (tenor horn) on Peter Kneale’s Variations on a Welsh Theme.
Also on the menu is a medley of tunes made popular by Glenn Miller. Tickets are available online, or at the door.
Also at St. Paul’s is a concert by opera singer Dmytro Garbovskyi June 14 at 6 p.m. Dmytro escaped from Russia at the start of the war in Ukraine, he is Ukrainian. His last concert here was in March 2025 and about 150 people who were there know he’s got a powerful voice and presented a memorable concert. Dmytro uses his concerts as fundraiser for Pure Heart Global Mission to aid children in war zones. You can get tickets online.
And this weekend is the time for the annual Arts for Peace festival. They have a new venue, the Aqua Theatre, and it’s on Sunday from 1 to 5 p.m.
This is a great event for the whole family with lots of things for kids to do, like make stuff, run around, and, well, is there anything else they do? It is for everyone of every age, but you must supply your own running. It’s free to attend
Leacock Medal Weekend
In two weeks the winner of the 79th Leacock Medal for Humour will be awarded. This year the authors shortlisted for the $25,000 prize are:
- Meredith Hambrock for She’s a Lamb
- Susin Nielsen for SNAP
- Mark Waddell for Colin Gets Promoted and Dooms the World
The wakened comes in two parts. Friday June 19 is the Meet the Author event at Hawk Ridge Golf Club with the short listed authors on hand along with the three finalists of the Student Humorous Short Story Competition, who will read their award winning stories. The students are:
- Zainabe Zahra Hirji, of Vaughan College High School, for Fries Are Not French
- Sharadha Giri, of Bayview Glen Independent School (Toronto), for Operation: It’s Basically Mine Already
- Ruijie Pang, of Upper Canada College, for A Case of Gastronomic Malpractice
The winner is Hirji and she receives $1,500, while the runners up get $750. The event is hosted by Brad Dunkley, who won the student award in 1993, and is of the Dunkley’s of the award sponsoring foundation.
The medal dinner is June 20 at Hawk Ridge Golf Club and it will be hosted by 2021 long lister Morgan Murray. The dinner will also feature 2023 medal winner Wayne Johnston, Three time long lister Rod Carley and 2019 winner Cathal Kelly who will give the address as the Mayor of Mariposa .
The deadline to get tickets is June 7 and you can get them online.
Youth Center Fundraisers
The Orillia Youth Centre has a great concert happening June 13 at the Leacock Museum June 13. The headliner is the Weber Brothers who have been making the rounds celebrating the release of their new, self-titled album, The Weber Brothers (after 18 albums they ran out of titles). Lance Anderson has joined the band for those concerts. Also performing are the Ronnie Douglas Blues Band and Andrew Alli and Josh Small, who youth center director Kevin Gangloff introduced us to a few years ago. This is going to be a great gig.
There’s one more happening June 12 with Andrew Alli and Josh Small and The Big Bad Jug Band. This one does not have an admission price (but you can make a donation) but you do need to register because space is limited. It’s billed as a porch concert.
Get tickets and registrations online.
Reviews
Classic Lightfoot Live returned to Orillia in early may for a concert at the Opera House. The band (John Stinson, Steve Eyers, Eric Kidd, Bruce Campbell and Liz Anderson) added Gord’s former producer Bob Doidge and violinist Alex Andrews last year, and this year two more violinists and an emcee, Ron Jones.
If there was anything that topped the other times I’ve seen this band it was hearing the trio of violins in If You Could Read My Mind, they add so much more to the song than replicating the part on a synthesizer. Hearing it done with the instruments for the first time live was chilling (I never saw Gord with a string section).
They also hooked up with a concert promoter/producer, WJS Entertainment. The show has evolved into more of a story then a just a concert with Steve talking about his personal experience with uncle Gord, and Eric and John giving in their insights into the music. Jones tells some stories as well. The one story they missed is Alex’s grandfather gave Gord his first professional gig as part of his big band.
The musicianship is a great as ever and other than the Lightfoot Band, no one else can claim the direct ties to Gord, or replicate the music, particularly Gord’s voice, so well. That said, the lead vocals were passed around to Liz and Alex who each sang a tune. Steve McEown made an appearance to sing I Used To Be A Country Singer, which he wrote and Gord recorded. Steve came back on for the encore and had the first turn singing Alberta Bound, to which every one took a verse or joined in for the chorus.
The band plays the music with a passion since most of the band members have a personal connection of some kind and it elevates the performance above what anyone else could hope to achieve.
The night before, the Orillia Concert Band had their 40th anniversary concert at St. Paul’s Centre. 2026 was better than 2025 in that last year both the OCB and Classic Lightfoot had their concerts on the same night, so this time I got to see both in their entirety.
All former conductors, with the exception of the first one, the late Bob Plunkett, were on hand to wave hi at the band. First up was OCB founder Stan Passfield who conducted Amparito Roca. That got a standing ovation. That was preceded by a great rendition of The Magnificent Seven to open the show. The band also played one of two pieces composed by Suds Sutherland, The Plunkett Suite, in the first half (Passfield’s Parade opened the second half). The first half closed with Finlandia, which to my mind is the best open and close to a set one could want.
In the second half Roy Menagh conducted English Folk Song Suite and James Hilts conducted La La Land. Both got standing ovations as well. Christina Bosco sang Thank You For The Music as the next to last piece, with James Campbell accompanying on piano. She also sang I Dreamed a Dream in the first half. Along the way Mark Smith, Hugh Coleman and Ian Buxton had solo features.
St. Paul’s was almost full for this concert, and Bob Plunkett’s kids, they’re not kids so much anymore, were on hand as well. Jeff Day returned to play in the clarinet section. Ross ARnold and jacquie Dancyger Arnold were given bouquets for the occasion of their last concert after performing with the band for 40 years. All together, the line up of tunes was very good, the moments with the conductors and soloists were great and it was a great way to celebrate the longevity of this group.
Then there was the Gathering Festival of First Nations Stories at the Rama Community Hall. This one is always interesting. Hearing the stories from people who have firsthand knowledge, or passed down through their families, is so much better than reading about it.
This year there was a bit of emphasis on children’s and young adult books. Angeline Boulley began by putting some stats in front of us. She was the Director of the Office of Indian Education at the U.S. Department of Education and some research showed of all books published at the time she was looking into it something less than 5% of them had anything to do with Native culture, and none of the ones counted were written by Natives. So she decided to do something about it, and her first book debuted on the New York Times bestseller list at #1.
Each of the speakers had interesting tales of what led them to write their stories and why target the audience they wrote for. Jessica Shonias’s story is interesting. She is a Nishnaabe language teacher and her story starts with hearing people speak the language, the elders around her, and she wanted to be able to speak with them. So she learned the language she has made a career of teaching the language conversationally.
Most surprising was Tristan Douglas. He’s just a youngster compared to the other speakers, and award winning writer, and a heck of a great speaker. One thing I’ve learned over the years is writers aren’t always the best at reading aloud their own stories, getting the dramatization across. Not so, with Tristan. He spoke with a confidence not everyone can muster, and was able to portray his stories as though he was recounting something while leaning against a kitchen counter at a party, as in ‘did you hear this one?’ They were really good stories too. I think he has a bright future as a writer.
And last of the things I saw, OMAH opened tow exhibits last weekend. The work of Drake Williams is in the small gallery at the back of the main floor. He paints in the style familiar to most and identifiable as ‘classic’ aboriginal work – and he does it very well. Drake is from Rama and this is his first show.
On the second floor is an exhibit of Paul shilling’s newest works. Many will know Paul’s stuff because faces play a large role in the art he creates. This exhibit has many of those, but there are also some landscape pieces unlike any I’ve seen form him before and some carvings.
Remembering Our Ancestors by Drake Williams 
Walking this World Together by Paul Shilling
The museum added one piece (above) from each artist to their permanent collection.
(Photos by Swartz – SUNonline/Orillia and Images Supplied)
