Saturday, September 05, 2015

Music inspired by the group of seven...

Playlist
Rheostatics - Discography
Barenaked Ladies - Are Men
Quatuor Alcan - Gould & MacMillan String Quartets
Oscar Peterson - The Canadiana Suite

Another sunny and very, very hot day in Toronto...

We are still in Riverside...


Here is our local market...


...and the bakery of choice - 3 croissants for $1.50 - 25p each - economical yum...


On the way back home, one of the cats from along the street was lounging in the sun...


...while the other was up the path to the side of the house, seemingly having given birth to a couple of kittens...


A breakfast undisturbed by the local wildlife this morning...



It was too hot even for the squirrel...


...and Steve had his shorts on...


But no rest for the holidaymakers - out and on to the street car having spotted University Avenue yesterday as looking like it might be interesting to walk up that way...



It's a broad avenue which was once kind of the main street in Toronto - it has its own Wikipedia page - the part we walked up was flanked by a good many hospital and medical buildings...




We crossed College Street - further to the West was the scene of the 1st great CD buying exercise of the holiday...


And into Queen's Park and the Ontario Legislative Building...





...which provided some welcome respite from the searing heat...


Anne was probably better prepared than your correspondent...


Once inside..



...we decided to take the tour...


Our guide, Erica, gave us a comprehensive tour and much information on the background to the building and the parliament itself...



For brevity's sake I won't go into the ins and outs but you can find info at the link for the Ontario Legislative Building...





This wing was rebuilt after having been completely destroyed by fire caused by workmen's tools...




Our tour ended with a story about the maces in the cases (see what I did there?)...

You can read about them here - suffice to say the wars between Canada and the USA figure rather largely in matters...

And Toronto used to be called York...


...and Ontario is rather large...


...and the Great Lakes contain over a fifth of all the fresh water on Earth...

Back out into the sun...






...and on up the extensions of the avenue, Queens Park...


This is the so-called Discovery District with houses of learning, museums and galleries featuring strongly...






We continued up Avenue Road and right into Yorkville Avenue...


Once again...


...jets overhead in the clear blue skies...



We passed Toronto Fire Station...


...and the Yorkville Library...


...before turning right again and setting off down Yonge Street...


...at the top of which lunch comprised wraps and cooling juice...


The Blue Jays were on TV - we were becoming Blue Jays fans and starting to understand the game...



At Refried Beats...


...I was allowed to purchase a Barenaked Ladies CD, despite being unable to sing the theme from "The Big Bang Theory" to the sales clerk...


ICe cream was required and we ducked into a McDonalds...


...before buying these upstairs at HMV as Anne took a look round shops she likes...



The Toronto Film Festival was up and coming...



From the corner of Yonge and Dundas...


..we capitulated to the heat and made our way...


...home...


...to get ready for tonight's Rheostatics performance - the original reason for our trip here...

When the three gigs were initially announced, I mentioned them on here and advised I probably would not come all the way to Canada from Scotland for a gig - but, chum since the sixties and avid reader of the blog, Moira, opined "Carpe Diem" and swayed me to look into it...

Having decided it was feasible and we could build a holiday around it, we booked the tickets...

And here we were,..

Back onto the street car...



...and to the Village Idiot Pub (VIP) to meet up with people we'd never seen before - on the left Darrin Cappe, who runs Rheostatics Live and may well be the bands biggest fan and Chris Schappert - who drove all the way from Nashville Tennessee for the gigs - but wasn't attending tonight's show - he was there last night - arriving just 5 minutes before the band went on - and is going again tomorrow...


Great to meet these guys after only ever corresponding over the ether about one of our favourite bands...

Here Darrin greets a young lady who he'd arranged a last minute ticket for...


Lucky lady - the entire three nights were sold out weeks ago...


Over and back into the AGO - your correspondent purchasing a commemorative T-Shirt which, hopefully one day, I will be thin enough to wear...


Once again the stage was set...


The view from further back...



Tonight we stood a just a few rows back to get better sound...


Dave Bidini on the drums for a few numbers while drummer Don Kerr played cello...


Dave seemed to be keeping a watchful eye on guitarist Martin Tielli - who suffers from stagefright to the extent that three years ago, the band was set to reunite for a series of gigs at the Horseshoe Tavern but Martin pulled out at the last minute...


The train driver's hat was for the third piece of the Group of Seven set, Boxcar...



Bassist Tim Vesely mostly played double bass tonight...


The visuals were superb...



...and featured clips of the seven artists at work...



Martin's famous double necked Ibanez got a cheer when he picked it up for just one piece...


It is hand painted with a version of a proposed design for a new Canadian flag known as The Pearson Pennant, designed by Alan Beddoe - the current flag was adopted in 1965... 



The four Rheos were once again joined onstage by Barenaked Ladies keyboardist Kevin Hearn and violinist and Tielli collaborator Hugh Marsh...


Bidini and Kerr play in the Bidiniband while Tim Vesely was in an excellent band called Violet Archers but now concentrates of film and TV music...

I'll shut up for a bit...














Bird calls were required at one point...


The audience and those onstage all obliged...








Lightning struck...




Later, we were required to howl like wolves...





All too soon the 65 minute set was over...



But the band returned for an encore - Tim Vesely coming on first with a bright green ukulele to play "Henry's Musical Beard" - a 27 second track from their album "The Nightline Sessions"...


...followed by "Bad Time to Be Poor", featuring Tim on guitar...


Last night they'd encored with four songs - "Claire", "It's Easy to Be With You", "Christopher" and "Horses"...


Tonight they continued with "Stolen Car"...





So, for the encore tonight they played the aforementioned "Henry's Musical Beard", "Bad Time to Be Poor " and "Stolen Car" along with "Legal Age Life at Variety Store" and "Christopher"...


Tomorrow there would be two encores, comprising all five extras from tonight plus "Green Sprouts Theme" (about the same length as "Henry's Musical Beard") but also including "Claire", which of course we missed out on by not being here Friday or Sunday...


Tomorrow we would be at Niagara on the lake and receiving a Tweet from Dave Bidini inviting us along to the Monarch Tavern for drinks and a special midnight show post the AGO, where the band and a host of guests played for a couple of hours - Chris Schappert advised getting back to his hotel at 3:30am...

That would have been a blast...


Back to tonight though and Martin, and indeed the whole band, had been playing and singing brilliantly...

But a mis-sung line in "Christopher" threw him off his step and the song was cut short...



But they immediately went into "Saskatchewan", another Martin song, and so the night ended with me hearing another of my favourite Rheos song live, for the second time in three days...



Over the moon, boys...


Out into the night...


What a night...

Absolutely brilliant...

Now we were both feeling a bit sad we'd miss tomorrow night...

But maybe some day we'll be back in Canada and the Rheos will be playing again...

Maybe...

Highlight of the Day : Rheostatics again...

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