Live music returns to Westman

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This article was published 12/07/2021 (1727 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

KILLARNEY — It took a few songs for them to ease back into bantering with their live audience, but the Chris Ghidoni Band got there Saturday night.

It was the blues-rock band’s first live performance since an outdoor show in Winnipeg last September, and signalled the return of live music to Westman.

“It feels wonderful,” front woman Chris Ghidoni said during a mid-show break outside Heritage Home for the Arts, beaming with enthusiasm after tearing through several blues riffs on guitar alongside her band.

“It’s a good crowd out here and they’re really enjoying it, and we’re really enjoying it.”

Although musicians have been afforded the opportunity to perform remotely via livestream throughout the pandemic, she said a lot gets lost when performing into an internet vacuum.

“We like that kind of interaction with the audience,” she said, something bandmates and jokesters Hughie McLaughlin (bass) and Doug Sullivan (drums) engaged in throughout the show, eliciting laughter and occasional feedback from the audience.

The past several months found the band practise as much as possible to maintain their creative outlet of choice, but Ghidoni said a crowd adds “a lot to the experience.”

“The energy you get from a crowd is inspiring, and it really pushes you to put more into the show. Rehearsals are great, but next to a live performance they feel kind of flat,” she said.

“There’s a real connection and you kind of feed off of one another in a shared experience, which is cool.”

Saturday’s performance was a free outdoor event hosted by the Killarney Turtle Mountain Arts Council outside the Heritage Home for the Arts.

Dubbed the “Two Shot Serenade,” the performance was limited to those able to prove they’d received both doses of a COVID-19 vaccination.

Everyone in attendance “has won the privilege of seeing this live concert firsthand,” Heritage Home for the Arts administrator Jane Ireland told the audience in her introduction.

“You have a right to not be vaccinated, but you don’t have a right to necessarily come to things if people are trying to keep their community safe.”

The audience of people, without a mask in sight, called to mind the pre-pandemic world Manitoba is in the process of easing back toward, pending vaccination rates meet certain thresholds prescribed by the province.

“I’m glad that Killarney is breaking that ice because everybody seems scared to break that ice,” said James Montgomery, general manager of Brandon Riverbank Inc.

Although the outdoor Fusion Credit Union Stage now graces Riverbank Discovery Centre grounds in Brandon, the past several months have yet to find a live audience enjoy any performances.

“We looked at doing something for Canada Day, maybe doing fireworks, but there was no appetite to taking a risk in gathering,” Montgomery said, adding that as infection rates lower in concert with a rise in vaccination rates, people will likely become more receptive to gathering in groups again.

“Once places start taking a bit of a risk, it’ll start opening the door,” he said, adding the group in Killarney, with their double-vaccination concert, appears to have found a unique means of easing people back in.

» tclarke@brandonsun.com

» Twitter: @TylerClarkeMB