If Peterborough Musicfest has taught us anything since its 1987 inception, it is this one enduring undeniable truth: country music fans are nothing short of rabid when it comes to their support of their favourite artists.

With that well in mind, the free summer concert series is again answering that demand in a big way, presenting perennial genre favourite Terri Clark on August 15th and, more imminently, a country music double shot this Saturday (July 28) featuring Peterborough native Tebey with brother-sister duo The Reklaws.

Admission is free to the 8 p.m. show.

Tebey

From a young age, it was clear that music would be central to Tebey Ottoh’s life.

In 1990, at just age seven, he won the 14-and-under male division of the Canadian Open Country Singing Contest, repeating that feat again in 1996 and 1998. After signing a development deal with a Nashville record label at age 15, he moved to that city with his father.

Upon returning to Canada three years later, he was a highly touted university football prospect but music remained his focus, evidenced by his signing a contract as a singer with Nashville-based BNA Records and another deal with Warner Chappell Music as a songwriter.

VIDEO: “Jealous of the Sun” – Tebey

It was as the former that Tebey made his first big mark, scoring a top North American hit in 2003 with the non-album single “We Shook Hands (Man To Man)”. That saw him nominated the following year for a Canadian Radio Music Award in the Best New Group/Solo Artist (Country) category.

Still, Tebey’s songwriting talents didn’t take a backseat as he penned songs for a number of artists outside of the country music genre, including Shawn Desman, Cher and One Direction. In 2017, his song “Somebody Else Will”, recorded by country artist Justin Moore, hit #1 on the U.S. Billboard chart. In addition, he wrote “All About Tonight” for British singer Pixie Lott. It was nominated for Single of the Year at the 2012 Brit Awards.

“I think people are surprised to find out that I’ve written songs for artists outside of the (country) genre,” says Tebey in a May 2018 interview with Kat Harlton of harltonempire.com.

VIDEO: “Now I Do” – Tebey

VIDEO: “When The Buzz Wears Off” – Tebey

“I think there is a misconception when it comes to songwriting and artists. I think that most people think artists write their own songs just because their name is on it. That is not always the case and is usually not the case, especially in pop music. I like being a songwriter behind the scenes when it comes to the pop stuff that I do. I’m not a pop star so I’d rather just try to write songs for people who are.”

Despite his huge success as a songwriter, Tebey didn’t neglect his career as a performer. His 2012 debut album The Wait produced the Top Ten radio hit “Somewhere In The Country”, while his 2014 cover of Avicii’s “Wake Me Up” sold in excess of 40,000 copies and was certified gold. It was included on his second album Two, which also included the hit single “Till It’s Gone”.

Tebey has since released two EPs, Old School and Love A Girl, with the latter featuring his latest hit single “Denim On Denim”.

VIDEO: “Denim on Denim” – Tebey

“There’s always going to be sounds that are hot right now but, at the end of the day, it’s all about great melodies,” says Tebey, who is also a multi-awarded music producer.

“I usually start with a bunch of songs that I love, then I start looking and thinking ‘Can this work for me? Is this song right for what I’m trying to do with this next phase of my artist career?’ I usually don’t have a theme because albums are not as popular anymore. There just isn’t the attention span to listen to an album front to back like someone would do with Thriller back in the day.”

“Anything entertainment looks great when you’re winning but they don’t really show the losing. It’s been a struggle. I’ve been in the game 15 years, since I was in high school, and I’m still trying to get my songs placed, still trying to have artists listen to my music and get radio play. It’s a constant struggle. It never really ends.”

The Reklaws

Also taking to the Fred Anderson Stage on Saturday, July 25th is brother-sister duo The Reklaws.

Cambridge, Ontario natives Jenna and Stuart Walker first turned heads in a big way when they won the SiriusXM Emerging Artist Award at Boots and Hearts in 2013. That led to the duo touring across Canada, opening for the likes of Blake Shelton, Dierks Bentley, and High Valley.

After working with a series of top Nashville songwriters and a year after appearing at Peterborough Musicfest in 2016, The Reklaws signed a recording contract with Universal Music Canada. That resulted in the recording of “Hometown Kids”, which debuted in the Top 15 on the Canadian country radio playlist and was streamed more than two million times.

VIDEO: “Hometown Kids” – The Reklaws

“We wanted to make sure we released a song that allowed people to see that we are just like them,” says Stuart in a March 2018 interview with Trevor Perkins of Music Update Central.

“We are the kids who love a Friday night bonfire with our hometown friends, as I’m sure many people do. It was important for us to write an anthem that introduced us to our fans.”

Also included on The Reklaws’ debut EP was “Wish You Were Beer”, recorded with the Juno-winning The James Barker Band (whose frontman hails from Woodville in Kawartha Lakes).

VIDEO: “Wish You Were Beer” – The Reklaws

“That was a song that we had written almost two years ago,” Stuart recalls. “For the longest time we looked at it as more of a joke song but after continued requests to sing it at our shows, and watching the audience react to it, we knew it was a hit and that something special had to be done with it. The James Barker Band stepped in and made this song cooler than we could have imagined. James’ ripping guitar solo, and the outro with all the boys, and of course Jenna, made it special.”

Long Live The Night, The Reklaws’ second EP release, debuted at #1 on the iTunes country sales chart with the title track currently rising on radio play charts.

“It contains three songs, each showing a different side of The Reklaws,” says Stuart of the new EP.

“We both like to be considered as lead singer, so when it comes to releasing songs we wanted to make sure that you are hearing both of us. You will hear a song by Stu, a song by Jenna and then one together. You will also hear that each song shows a different side of our Reklaw sound — a pop side as well as a country side,”

VIDEO: “Seeing Stars” – The Reklaws

VIDEO: “Long Live The Night” – The Reklaws

Peterborough Musicfest is presenting 18 free-admission concerts featuring a total of 20 acts during its 32nd season — each staged on Wednesday and Saturday nights at Del Crary Park.

Overseen by general manager Tracey Randall and staff, a board of directors, and numerous volunteers, Peterborough Musicfest’s stated mission is to “provide diverse, affordable live music to enrich cultural and economic prosperity in our community.”

For more information on this concert or the entire 2018 season, visit www.ptbomusicfest.ca or phone the Peterborough Musicfest office at 705-755-1111.

By asking “Who Killed Snow White?”, 4th Line Theatre’s second production of its 2018 summer playbill creates the impression that a great mystery will be solved before the final line is delivered.

Far for us to argue with multi-awarded playwright Judith Thompson’s intent but, as she herself acknowledged during a recent sit-down at 4th Line Theatre’s Winslow Farm home, her script more importantly dissects “what” killed Snow White in its quest to answer “who”.

Exploring the journey of a family supporting one its own as she battles to stay strong in the face of bullying and harassment, Who Killed Snow White? shines an insightful yet disturbing light on the roots of sexual violence and “the culture of toxic masculinity” that has dominated news headlines with increasing regularity.

According to Thompson, an “urgency to do something” — which she shares with director Kim Blackwell — is rooted in outrage.

“We’re not MPs, we can’t create policy but we can reach an audience through theatre,” says Thompson, who has done just that with critically acclaimed regularity since penning her first play, The Crackwalker, close to 40 years ago.

“It’s an honour for me to work on this story, but it’s a terrible and disquieting experience to dive deeply into it. Sadly, it is local. I haven’t based it on a local story but we know that in every town, in every province, something like this has happened. It’s an epidemic.”

According to Blackwell, the roots of the play go back a few years to when she and Thompson got together with a group of young people in Peterborough to hear firsthand what issues they face.

“I was really struck by the pain they were in and how prevalent it is,” says Blackwell, who has directed 16 4th Line Theatre productions including seven world premieres.

“The young people in the play’s chorus, aged nine to sixteen, they’re all facing some form of harassment or bullying on social media. I had no idea. As a parent of a 12-year-old daughter, it really struck me.

“It’s important to explore this issue. We’re exploring it in a really entertaining, thoughtful and compelling way. There’s nothing shocking or gratuitous in the piece. Judith has made it true for us and for this community. I think there’s an opportunity here for families to come together and start having the conversation.”

“Our fear of the topic is stopping us from talking to our kids in a thoughtful and honest and open way. There’s a lot of hidden stuff on social media. There are sites we don’t know about that they (our kids) are on where they’re being bullied and harassed. Not Facebook. That’s for us old guys. A zillion other sites we’re not aware of. It’s about talking to our kids about what they’re experiencing and not being afraid to do so.”

Portraying Serena — the young girl being bullied and harassed — is Toronto-based actress and writer Grace Thompson, the playwright’s daughter. Her character, she says, “is different … she starts school being bullied. She doesn’t fit in.”

Serena befriends Riley, played by veteran 4th Line actor Tom Keat.

“He’s queer and doesn’t know if he’s going to fit in,” Grace explains. “She says ‘People don’t like me, just so you know. Be aware. You hang out with me you might be lumped in. This isn’t going to help your social situation.’

“But with that friendship comes power. Eventually her friend (Fantasia, played by Cassandra Guthrie), who turned against her, is back and they form this trio. They feel unstoppable, like they can take on high school. They get invited to a party and she starts to feel she’s climbing the social ladder. Things are getting better, but at this party everything goes downhill. All hope falls apart.”

“There are so many Serenas. I knew Serenas. I was a Serena. I think everyone will be able to see themselves in this character. At one point, everyone has felt like an underdog and felt they weren’t seen in a proper way. This is happening right now everywhere and it’s not talked about enough, and because it’s not talked about enough, nothing’s been done about it. Art tells the story in a way that we can emotionally connect to it.”

Both playwright Judith Thompson and director Kim Blackwell are well aware the play’s subject matter may prove difficult for audience members who have been affected by bullying and harassment — either directly or through the trials of a family member or friend.

“We see people triggered in all of our plays,” says Blackwell. “We saw it last year with The History of Drinking in Cavan. People were triggered by the themes of alcohol and alcoholism and abuse.

“We expect some triggering, even though we’re taking a very gentle hand with the subject matter. We’ve been working with the Kawartha Sexual Assault Centre and they’re going to have workers on site every night. There’s a lot of information around resources in the house program.”

Thompson adds that while the 4th Line Line audience is typically “very sophisticated”, it’s not on the same playing field as a Toronto audience in terms of its exposure to strong language and graphic content.

“Because it’s such a harsh subject, we need to deliver it gently. But people are going to be reeling, especially if they’re triggered in some way.”

One thing Thompson is very sure of is the Millbrook venue is the perfect setting for the world premiere of her play.

“It was important to Kim and I that it not be something you would see on Degrassi. Why do we need the theatre for this and why do we need 4th Line Theatre? Because the lead character can ride in on a white horse in her mother’s dream. There is a pond that she submerges herself in.

“I have a scene at the beginning where the mother is fantasizing about all the dead young girls and boys who have taken their own lives, rising from the dead. How could I anywhere else have 20 young people rising in the long grass to the incredible music that Justin (Hiscox) creates? How beautiful is that?”

In Thompson, Blackwell says she couldn’t have asked for a better collaborator, terming her “incredibly responsive … she knows what she wants and she’s very clear about that.”

As for the difficult subject matter in Who Killed Snow White?, Blackwell has no reservations whatsoever in presenting it to local audiences.

“I hope the audience would trust us to not steer them wrong,” she says. “I know there’s concern out there about the play, but we’re committed to doing it. We think we also have to develop a new audience here. We want to honour our loyal long-term audience but audiences are aging. It’s about finding balance.

“A play like this is about trying something and then evaluating it. We’re not changing our mandate. The things on tap for the next three years are much more solidly in line with the historical mandate, but I don’t think it hurts every once in awhile to try something like this and explore a topic that is out there everywhere.”

With opening night fast approaching, Thompson displays an excitement that belies her having sat in on the opening of dozens of her plays.

“It never gets old,” says the 2005 Order of Canada recipient. “One has reached inside people. That’s such an honour. I can die now. I have a legacy.”

With musical direction, original music and arrangements by Justin Hiscox, choreography by Monica Dottor, costume design by Meredith Hubbard, set design by James McCoy, sound design by Esther Vincent, and fight direction by Edward Belanger, Who Killed Snow White? runs from August 6th to 25th, Mondays to Saturdays, beginning at 6 p.m.

Also among the cast are Maja Ardal, Cynthia Ashperger, Mark Hiscox, Christian Lloyd, Andrei Preda, Saskia Tomkins, and Steven Vlahos, along with many community volunteer actors.

Who Killed Snow White? is sponsored by Lakefield College School and the MENding Program at the Kawartha Sexual Assault Centre.

Tickets can be purchased by calling 1-800-814-0055 or 705-932-4445, online www.4thlinetheatre.on.ca, emailing boxoffice@4thlinetheatre.on.ca, at in person at 4th Line Theatre’s box office (4 Tupper St., Millbrook) or at the Peterborough Museum and Archives (300 Hunter St. E., Peterborough).

The Peterborough Folk Festival has announced the full line-up of artists for the free family-friendly music festival in August.

In addition to already-announced headliners Terra Lightfoot, Bedouin Soundclash, and Basia Bulat, and the reunion of local band The Spades, the festival will feature performances by Chad VanGaalen, Logan Staats, My Son the Hurricane, The Weather Station, Kalle Mattson, Jennifer Castle, Glen McFarlane, and Tequila Jay & Los Diablos.

Local musicians in the line-up are Mary-Kate Edwards, Broken Harmony, The Silver Hearts, Hillary Dumoulin, Kate Suhr, and Melissa Payne.

The festival kicks off with a ticketed concert featuring Terra Lightfoot on Friday, August 17th at 8 p.m. at the Market Hall Performing Arts Centre. Hillary Dumoulin, the 2018 Peterborough Folk Festival Emerging Arts, will be opening.

Tickets are $30 for assigned seating and are available at the Market Hall Box Office or online at markethall.org.

VIDEO: “Host Body” – Performed and animated by Chad VanGaalen

The remainder of the festival takes place at Nichols Oval Park on Saturday and Sunday. Admission is free and, in addition to musical performances, there will be street food, an artisan and craft village, children’s activities, and a licensed pavillon.

On Saturday, August 18th, the line-up includes Bedouin Soundclash, The Spades, Chad VanGaalen, Kalle Mattson, Mary-Kate Edwards, Broken Harmony, Hilary Dumoulin, The Weather Station, Tequila Jay & Los Diablos, Glen McFarlane, and Terra Lightfoot.

VIDEO: “The Lucky Ones” – Logan Staats

The festival continues on Sunday, August 19th with performances by Basia Bulat, Kate Suhr, Jennifer Castle, The Silver Hearts, Melissa Payne, Splash N’ Boots, Logan Staats, and My Son the Hurricane.

There will also be after-parties at the Historic Red Dog Tavern in downtown Peterborough on both Saturday and Sunday night, featuring some of each day’s performers (the full line-up is to be announced). These age of majority events are free, but the festival will be accepting donations at the door.

The Peterborough Folk Festival, which is a not-for-profit organization, is still seeking volunteers to help out. As well as a good feeling, volunteers receive a limited edition volunteer t-shirt, complimentary food and drinks during the festival, and first access to year-round festival programming. To volunteer, visit www.peterboroughfolkfest.com/volunteer.

VIDEO: “Kids On The Run” – Kalle Mattson

The story will be updated as more details become available.

British comedian Chris Gibbs has had many titles in his life. He’s been a comedian, street performer, acrobatic tumbler, author, and television and film actor. However, possibly his scariest title has been that as a father, which is the subject of Chris’ one-man show Like Father, Like Son? Sorry , opening tonight (July 24) at Globus Theatre at Lakeview Arts Barn in Bobcaygeon.

Chris began his career as a street performer in the early 1990s in London’s Convent Gardens, where he combined acrobatics and comedy after years of perfecting his craft as part of an acrobatic duo called Hoopa! Chris travelled through Europe, as well as Australia, New Zealand, and Canada, bringing his unique sense of humour to audiences everywhere.

“Street performing doesn’t have to include skill, but it very often does,” Chris says. “Your skill is your excuse to do a show, but you’re really doing a comedic show.”

Eventually Hoopa! had the opportunity to move indoors, where Chris began to experiment more with stand-up and improv. Upon moving to Canada in 2002, Chris discovered that the best way to continue his craft was by leaving stand-up behind and writing one-man comedy shows for the Fringe theatre circuit.

“I was in a weird situation where I had done stand-up in comedy clubs in London, but it all works a bit different in Canada,” Chris says. “If you do shows in the Fringes its easier … and honestly a bit more lucrative to just write a one-man show and tour it around the Fringe.”

Chris’ first show was “a weird Canadian version” of a show he had done in New Zealand.

“It wasn’t a particularly good show, but there was a review in (Toronto’s) NOW Magazine that described it as ‘a funny one-man show about doing a bad one-man show’,” he recalls. “Well, it wasn’t that, but it was now! So I rewrote it to fit that, and then it was really fun.”

It was during a 2007 performance in Winnipeg that Chris went off book, launching the development of Like Father, Like Son? Sorry . Earlier that week, Chris had become a father and, instead of performing his one-man show, he decided to just get on stage and talk about becoming a new dad.

“I was supposed to be doing a different show,” Chris explains. “My son was born on a Saturday, and on Wednesday I was performing my first one-man show at the Winnipeg Fringe. But I got up on the stage and said ‘I want to just talk about this baby that I just had.’ The thing about stand-up shows is that you can kind of mess around with the material. So I started developing material for this show that night, but I didn’t start touring it until two years later.”

Chris explains it was his fear of becoming a father that drove him to focus on the topic.

“I found is that I spent a long time thinking that I could never be a dad,” he says. “I had put the idea of fatherhood on a pedestal, so when I found out I was going to be a father I thought this would be the most difficult job that anybody could ever do and, clearly, I am going to mess this up. There are other jobs I could do that could be difficult, and clearly I could mess them up, but the only person who would get hurt is me. But when it’s fatherhood, this could be terrible.”

Chris admits that part of his fear of his inadequacy of being a father was by attempting to measure up to the way fathers are portrayed in pop culture, as well as memories of his own father.

“I realized that the judgement I was taking was from the father (figure) in movies, like Superman’s father Jor-El, and ridiculous ideas of what fathers are. But my dad died when I was nineteen. It’s not like I didn’t know him, but we never had a chance to know each other as adults. So there was a mythical, with a small ‘m’ quality, to my father.

“I just remember my father as having an abiding sense of calm, but I never knew him well enough to ever see doubt, or all the things that now I know logically must have been there. It was just that dad knew what to do, and if there was a problem dad would take care of it.

“There is an element that I touch on in the show, when you realize your child is going to be born and you think ‘Oh no, I haven’t lived the right life for this, I’ve made terrible decisions!’. So it’s a bit about that.”

Although Chris describes the show as being just a “series of jokes,” he hints at a bigger meaning within the show the audience may or may not see.

“When I started working on this show I had something I wanted to work towards, as if it was all a deep lesson but in the end I found out that it was just a bunch of jokes,” he says coyly. “But every now and then I’d think again that it might be a deep important lesson. What’s funny is that I had somebody a month ago who said ‘I loved that point you made in that show’ and I had thought that nobody had noticed.

“The trouble is that when you do a comedy show, and you have one serious bit, you judge it like you would a comedy, and when nobody laughs you think that they didn’t like that bit.”

It’s over a decade since Chris first developed the show, and his son Beckett is now 11 years old.

“He’s almost as tall as me,” Chris says with pride. “He’s a human being. I always think about it as a show about him, but it never really was. It’s actually a show about me becoming a dad as much as it’s all about him being a baby.”

Although Beckett has seen some of his father’s work, he has yet to see his father perform Like Father, Like Son? Sorry . However, Chris says that one night during the Globus run of the show he plans to finally have Beckett in the audience to see, for the first time, the show that was written about him.

“I’ve never done it nearby where he’s been able to see it,” Chris explains. “I’ve tended to have been touring it out west. The timing had to be right and he had to be old enough to enjoy it. I’m really excited about him finally seeing it.

“I am so ridiculously smug about how cool my son is. What I took away from my parents is that you’re never going to get it right, so what I owe him is that I constantly worry about getting it right or not … as long as I’m always thinking about it, and wondering if I did it well. When he was born, all I thought was ‘If he can be happy, that’s all I want.'”

Chris Gibbs is a brilliantly funny man with a wonderful wit, and Like Father, Like Son? Sorry  is a chance to see one of Canada’s most popular comedians right in our own back yard. It will be a wonderful night of comedy and storytelling.

Like Father, Like Son? Sorry  runs from Tuesday, July 24th until Saturday, August 4th at the Lakeview Arts Barn in Bobcaygeon. Shows start at 8 p.m., with 2 p.m. matinees on July 28th and August 2nd.

A three-course table d’hôte menu is available at 6 p.m. prior to every evening performance. Tickets are $34.50 for the show only, or $71 if you want the dinner and the show. For tickets, visit the box office at Lakeview Arts Barn or call 1-800-304-7897 or 705-738-2037.