LOCALS COFFEE HOUSE – THE FIRST OF THE SEASON, October 12, 2013, 7:30pm at the Studio / Stage Door, Cranbrook

This was a very auspicious start to the season – LOCALS Coffee House played to a sold out house on Saturday night. The local musicians, from novices to the most seasoned veteran of the coffee house circuit, were all set for the night’s activities. Dennis Kerr (vocals and guitar) moved to area recently and he kicked off the night with songs about his new found East Kootenay experiences. Songs such as I Am Getting Sick of it , Bull River Mosquitoes, Fort Steele and Dean Brodie’s Brothers. Shauna Plant is a well known local performer in The Rosie Brown Band who played a little later in the evening. In the meantime her children are seeking to displace her as the premier musician in the family. Her son Isaac was joined by his sister Meaghan and her friend Morgan Bulloch (the back up vocalists who will henceforth be known as the M&M’s) for a set of Josh Ritter songs that included Joy to You Baby, Certain Light and Kathleen. There is a rumour going around that Issac has resorted to sticking screw drivers into power outlets to get his hair into such tip top shape. The Rosie Brown Band was one member short for their performance. Their dobro player and fellow vocalist, Heather Gemmell, was way off in the boonies on a hiking trip. The gorgeous vocal ensemble is the signature ingredient of their sound and that remained intact for Long Gone and Cosima Wells’ showpiece Oh Suzanna. Janice Nickli on upright bass, Paige Lennox on banjo and Shauna Plant on mandolin shared the instrumental solo chores. The band member were obviously enjoying them selves. Steve Lungall, otherwise known as Pot Luck Steve, with the aid of his beautiful assistants, Shelagh Redecopp and Shauna Plant did the little one scene performance of the Drunken Scotsman and his prized “member”. Also on the racy side was the Grit Laskin song The Photographers. To ensure that we were not all destined for a quick trip to hell Steve finished his set with a Gospel song.  Larry MacKenzie is a long time song writer and guitarist and over the years has been a staple on the local music scene. In his domestic life Larry tends to over build so when he started building a new wood shed he didn’t realize how much he over built until his wife appropriated the building to use as a car port. Never-the-less he took time off from these construction chores and hooked up with bass player Ferdy Belland to stroll though some of his original material. There was some choice slide guitar on one particular tune. The songs included A Day at a Time, Be a Good Little Boy, A Ha Ha Road, and My Shoes. The last act of the evening was Sheva (Van and Shelagh Redecopp) with Steve Jones on upright bass and young Drew Lyle on vocals and mandolin. With a whole new batch of songs that included Next Go Round (Old Crow Medicine Show), Flowers in Your Hair, Trials and Troubles, Stubborn Love and and a wonderful fiddle instrumental called Midnight on the Water. The instrumental was in the unusual fiddle tuning of DDAD. The highest compliment I can pay to any performer is one “where the music takes me some where else”. It doesn’t happen often, in fact the last time was at a concert by the clawhammer banjo player Chris Coole, but on Saturday night Sheva  took me way, way out there. Great job guys.  As always the volunteers make LOCALS possible and thanks must go  to all of those behind the scenes for creating a such wonderful evening. Here are some images from the night.

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