The 2025 Folkus Line-Up - theHumm November 2024

By — Steve Wildesmith is the Artistic Director of the Folkus Concert Series

Taking place at the most beautiful venue in Almonte, our very own Old Town Hall, we kick off the 2025 Folkus season on January 25 with Whitehorse, an incredible Canadian husband-and-wife duo that have a pedigree that puts them in the company of Canadian music hall of famers. Luke Doucet and Melissa McClelland are Whitehorse, and together they make incredible music. If you have not heard of their band you have likely heard them individually, as both Luke and Melissa are sought-after studio players. For the past 20 years they have been part of Sarah McLachlan’s touring band.

Our February 22 show will be a lovely intimate evening beginning with Almonte songwriter Mike Wattie. Mike will serenade us with some of his original songs, and his playing, wordsmithing and performance will keep us smiling in our seats.

Our headliner for February is the one and only Steve Poltz, a Halifax native who has spent much of his musical career in Nashville working for himself and co-writing with his musical friends. His band the Rugburns had a major label deal, as did Poltz as a solo performer. And Steve even cowrote a gigantic hit, Jewel’s You Were Meant for Me. Poltz is an itinerant singer-songwriter in the tradition of Woody Guthrie, the troubadours of yore, but with a much better sense of humour.

You don’t look at your watch during a Steve Poltz show. You’re riveted to the man, the stories and the music. There is no down time, your mind doesn’t wander, even if you’ve never heard any of the songs before. Poltz is just that good. Even after thousands of shows (but who’s counting?), he hits the stage with the same energy and always declares: “This is the greatest show of my life.”

It’s why he’s quietly emerged as the kind of live phenomenon celebrated passionately by a diehard fanbase worldwide and renowned as a festival favourite. It’s why his music has crept into pop culture via collaborations with everyone from Jewel and Billy Strings to Molly Tuttle, Sierra Hull, Nicki Bluhm, Oliver Wood, and even the late Mojo Nixon. It’s why after over a dozen albums, he’s still creatively firing on all cylinders and critically acclaimed by the likes of Rolling Stone, Associated Press, Billboard, and many more.

Our March 22 show highlights the talents in our own neck of the woods, as the evening begins with Almonte’s own Jen Noxon and the Brindled Cats, featuring Jennifer Noxon, Brendan Gawn and Rob McMurray. After their unique presentation, the evening continues in the company of Lynn Miles and Keith Glass.

Coming from a country renowned for having outstanding singer-songwriters, Lynn Miles is considered Canadian songwriting royalty. With a JUNO Award in 2003 for Roots Traditional Album of the year, Lynn subsequently scored JUNO nominations in 2006 and 2011. She has taken home six Canadian Folk Music Awards, including three for Songwriter of the Year.

Lynn was a staff songwriter for LA-based publisher Criterion Music alongside Lyle Lovett, Rosanne Cash and Rodney Crowell. Her first record deal was with Rounder Records in the US and Continental Records in The Netherlands. She is currently signed to True North Records in Canada.

On her newest album, Tumble WeedyWorld, she sings about the differences between people, which ultimately only demonstrates how we are so much the same. Her emotive voice carries each lyric with breathtaking clarity and heart-wrenching honesty. This album has been nominated for a Canadian Folk Music Award for Album of the year.

Together Keith and Lynn create a musical performance that moves through the vast repertoire of Lynn’s many albums, leaving the audience sweetly satiated.

Our last show of the season required some jostling and a quick decision to move the from our traditional last Saturday of the month to the first Saturday of April in order to capture my personal “wild card” show. Just as last year I managed to get “The Moth Project” and give our series something very different, this season we will be blessed with Maria Doyle Kennedy, a connection I owe to my wife Cara Wildesmith, as she was friends with Maria’s husband Keiran. We have seen this amazing couple several times in the past decade, and I had been in touch with Keiran and Maria for the past year hoping to book them. As fate would have it, a few weeks ago, she wrote me and said she would be doing a show at Hugh’s Room in Toronto as she travelled enroute from Ireland to the USA to do filming for one of her many theatrical commitments, and would fit Almonte in if we could get our hall for April 5.

Maria Doyle Kennedy is best known as an accomplished actress; however, her life partner is Keiran Kennedy — an extremely talented multi-instrumentalist who has a history of musical accomplishments himself, not the least of which was a long stint in the popular band Hothouse Flowers, and we have found a side of Maria that is equal to her acting abilities in the form of song.

Her official bio reads: “Polymath Maria Doyle Kennedy has sustained a varied and eclectic career in the Arts for more than 3 decades. Music is her first love, and following time spent in several bands she set up her own record label in 2000 and has released 11 solo albums to date. Maria’s most recent album, Fire on the Roof of Eden, was listed in their albums of the year by The Irish Times, and Hot Press described her as “one of Ireland’s most accomplished vocalists and a national treasure.”

Maria and Kieran have been made artists in residence in Kilruddery, where they are currently writing and recording a new album. Together they weave an intimate evening that is both captivating and charming. Maria is a consummate storyteller, and with Keiran supporting her voice as she sings her songs of life and love and lessons learned, the result is a most memorable evening.

This year’s subscriber tickets go on sale at Tickets Please (TicketsPlease.ca, 485–6434) on November 1. Our subscriber tickets are for all 4 shows, the price is $130 plus fees, and sales are limited to 150 passes, allowing 30 singles tickets to be sold for each show. Singles will go on sale on January 1, at $60 for the January show, $38 for February and March, and $50 for April.

Hope to see you there!

Shane Belanger — Having a Whale of a Time - theHumm November 2024

By Sally Hansen

Art… and Soul

Pareidolia is the tendency to see faces or other patterns in response to an ambiguous visual stimulus. If you’ve ever spotted a hidden dragon in the clouds, or the man in the moon, you’ve experienced pareidolia.

Blacksmith artist Shane Belanger uses his extraordinary gift for detecting elusive creatures in the random patterns of wood. The Lanark Highlands artist exploits his innate ability to create striking wooden and steel sculptures. He combines incredibly shaped pie......

The 2025 Folkus Line-Up - theHumm November 2024