This Week In Art/Culture/Entertainment
By John Swartz
This is a busy weekend, or at least a Saturday, with three major events taking place. The annual Orillia Rotary Club Classic and Custom Car Show will use up all the on-street parking – and then some – downtown all day. Usually there are 400 or more cars on display along with thousands of people attending.
There will be music by Double the Pleasure and helping to hand out awards at 3 p.m. are former Toronto Star auto expert Jim Kenzie and race car driver/writer/radio host Brian Makse.
Later, mere hours really, the annual Starry Night event happens on Peter Street. This year a twist has been added, a paint battle. What’s that? A selection of artists (Dominic Bingham, Grace Devries, Daphne Gray, Kate Henderson and Maya Kurzudlowski) each will have a canvas and a theme and will paint something within a time limit. There will be a winner, voted by you.
There will be some music provided by Andrew Woodill and Dave Shaw and 25 artists, one of which is a collective, will have their stuff arranged outside. OMAH has a Vintage Pop-up Market happening during Starry Night. The fun starts at 7 p.m.
Meanwhile the annual Rama Pow Wow is happening all day Saturday and Sunday at the John Snache Memorial Community Grounds. There are a number of competition classes performing during the afternoon both days. The best time to go is for the grand entries where all participants parade into the circle and dance. This happens at 1 p.m. Saturday and 12:30 p.m. Sunday. If you can’t make but still want to see what’s up, you can watch the live stream here.
Boats and Dogs
The annual Waterfront Festival’s two feature events, the Cardboard Boat Race and the Dock Diving Dogs were well attended. The boat race did not have as many spectacular sinkings as past years, but it did have something not seen often. Vicki McNaney dressed as the captain of her own ship, made a beeline for the marker, turned around and did the same for shore. She won the race in maybe the fastest time ever and no other boat crew managed to make a dent in her boat.
There is no prize for ‘winning the race’, as in the first to return to the starting line. That’s mainly because it’s such a rare thing to happen. Vicki did pick up an award for the smallest boat. The Longest Boat Floating Award went to a couple kids who paddled a Lego themed box.
Nixon Boyd and Scott Olgard picked up the award for Biggest Boat, which was called the Tragically Ship. The Titanic Award, for best sinking, which happened early and was self inflicted, went to North Home Power.
A boat crewed by Orillia councillors Campbell, Durnford, Fallis and Czetwerzuk won an ward, possibly for Best Dressed Crew; they for once were not sunk, and their theme was Blue Man Group.
Later the tiny beach by the government dock went to the dogs for the diving competition. The Saturday version of this event had 25 dogs competing and Sundays had 15.
Jerica Obee and pet, Buck, added a twist. When Buck’s heat was finished, Jerica jumped in and made a few dives for the bottom. It turned out one of her rings slipped off her finger when tossing Buck’s ball into the lake. The weird part is she found it.
As always there were funny moments. One dog needed remedial training for what the job was, another got such good air it was ahead of its toy on the jump, while another did a twist and snatched its toy out of the air.
There were entrants from Midland and Gravenhurst taking part. Here’s a sample of some of the best dives.
RRRR Comes Before SSSS
Labour Day Weekend is the annual Pirate Party at the Port of Orillia. I don’t know about you, but I think the highlight will be the Mudmen playing music on Friday night, and for others it might be the Walk The Plank event Saturday at 4 p.m..
There will be on the water re-enactments, Saturday and Sunday, as well as cannon practice on the field at Couchiching Beach Park. Sunday at 5 p.m. there is a magic show with Captain Corbin The Magical Pirate.
The Fat Tony Band plays music Saturday night and the Orangeman on Sunday. Music performances start at 8 p.m., except for No Great Mischief at 11 a.m. Sunday It’s also the weekend for Movies in the Park and Friday’s pick is Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl at 9 p.m. at the Aqua Theatre.
The Shorts
- Lorna Bolden and Doc Higgins have signed up their Brant Street residence to participate in the annual Play Music on the Porch Day August 29. People all over the world have events happening in their localities. They are doing it from 2 to 6 p.m. and you can send a message if you’d like to play some folk, country, blues, Celtic, or even baroque music. Drop by to listen. Bring a lawn chair.
- The 7th annual Trunk or Treat is happening Oct. 24 at ODAS Park. Registration for those bringing their trunks is open now online. Tickets are available at the same URL starting Oct. 5. This is a fundraiser for the Orillia Youth Centre.
- North Simcoe Arts is looking for people to serve on its bursary review committee. Interested parties with some experience in arts can email communications@northsimcoearts.ca.
- Nominations for the annual Art and Culture Awards (November 25 at Creative Nomad Studios) are now open and you can find nomination forms now online.
- The Aqua Theater weekend schedule looks like this: the Saturday evening schedule has three acts – Sleepy Jan, Consenting Adults and Nate Mills August 22. Showtime is at 6:30 p.m. Sunday evening has the Simcoe County Band August 23. Concerts start at 6:30 p.m.
- Bleeker another new tune they’ve made a video for in advance of a full album coming soon. Outside was shot in various locations around town. They have been making some very good videos for the new batch of tunes they’ve put out. They will also be opening for The Trews at Casino Rama for a Soldiers’ Memorial Hospital Foundation fundraiser in October. You can get tickets for that show here. The foundation is also running a 50/50 draw in conjunction with the concert and you can get a ticket online.
- Something different is happening at the legion Sept. 26 at 7 p.m. called Life is Sad. The blurb says, “evening devoted to the beauty of melancholy through folk music” and if you know Nate Mills is involved, then you know it won’t be all tears. He’s performing along with Ellis, Dogmouth, Dylan Court, and Wm. Matt Miller and video by Tyler Grace. Admission is $15.
- Paso Por Paso has a fundraiser with comedian Martha Chaves Sept. 27 at St. Paul’s Centre. This comes with a light lunch. The show is at 3 p.m. and all proceeds go to supporting Maya communities in Guatemala. Call 705-955-7760 for tickets.
- Congrats to Rebekah Hawker who has been selected as a songwriter fellow for the MusiCounts Fellowship for Emerging Songwriters & Composers. Her tune, Quit My Habit, will be transformed into a choral piece of music and used in music classrooms across the country.
- The Orillia Museum of Art and History has two new exhibits The Many Faces of Paul Shilling: A Retrospective. and Awaken The Spirits. – art by Rama’s Drake Williams; other exhibits to see are a textile show, From Hand to Heirloom: The Art of Craft , and the permanent exhibit of Gordon Lightfoot’s personal effects… Cloud Gallery has their Great Big Summer Show for all of August… Peter Street Fine Arts had a collection of work from the Bayside Artists up this month.
- Mariposa has a couple concerts in the fall with tickets on sale now. Oct. 20 Joel Plaskett will be at St. Paul’s Centre. Nov. 21 a different sort of thing happens at the Opera House. The Organ Summit features Lance Anderson, Matt Weidinger and Cole Mendez, along with two members of Matt’s band, The Tonewheels, Chris Latta (guitar) and Mike Rajna (drums). They will answer the question, what is better than having a Hammond B3 organ on stage? Two B3s. Lance, Matt and Cole will rotate on the keyboards all night long. Get tickets for Joel here, and for Lance and company here.
- The Golden Scoundrels and the Big Bad Jug Band are playing at the legion Sept. 10. You can get tickets online.
- Some concerts happening at the Opera House include the Old Dance Hall Players doing Don’t Sweat the Fall Stuff Sept. 11 (tickets); the Orillia Jazz Fest has two events in October; on the 16th a showcase of original compositions developed by Orillia high school students during Arts Orillia’s youth jazz workshop with Alondra Vega and Jacob Thompson and other performances, happens (tickets), and Oct. 17 Jane Bunnett and Maqueque play Cuban jazz (tickets), and the Lightfoot Band is in Oct. 29 (tickets).
- Quayle’s Brewery has Sydney Riley playing Aug. 22; Ron Whitman Aug. 23; Jakob Pearce Aug. 27; My Missing Piece Aug. 28 and Hopstock (4 bands, two stages) Aug 29 all day and nto the evening… Hog ‘N Penny has Jakob Pearce and Rob Drake playing Aug. 22 and a jam Sunday afternoons… Even Steven plays the Dockyard Grill in Lagoon City Aug. 22… the ANAF club has Bealk Stree playing Aug. 22 and Back Road Revival Sunday Aug. 23 at 2 p.m.; Lake Country has Dave Shaw hosting an open mic Aug. 13… Studabakers has live music Thursday nights… Kensingtons has an open mic every Tuesday evening.
(Photos by Swartz – SUNonline/Orillia and Images Supplied) Main: 2024 Rotary Downtown Classic and Custom Car Show
