Canadian blues festivals and venues range from small, community-based festivals that feature mostly local performers to major corporate-sponsored festivals that draw nationally- and internationally-prominent blues bands and huge crowds. Some of the large festivals include the Ottawa Bluesfest, the Harvest Jazz & Blues Festival in Fredericton, New Brunswick, and the Edmonton's Labatt Blues Festival. These festivals, which are usually organized by volunteer-based blues societies, are an important part of the Canadian blues scene. Bluesfest International produces two shows on the third weekend of July in both Windsor and London, Ontario. The premiere event was in downtown Windsor in 1995 and the London festival was added 6 years later.
Canadian blues bands also appear at a range of venues, including bars, taverns, lounges, and community centre concert series. Only a small number of these venues specialize in blues music; in most cases, venues will have a "blues night" or an occasional blues series. Some of the best-known blues venues in Toronto are Healey's (named for former owner, the late Jeff Healey) and The Silver Dollar Room. Other well-known Canadian venues include Boon's House in Hamilton, Ontario, Café Campus in Montreal, Blues at the Bow Live in Alberta, Blues On Whyte in Edmonton, The Shamrock Hotel in Calgary, and The Yale in Vancouver.
Famous quotes containing the words list of, list, canadian, blues and/or festivals:
“Thirty—the promise of a decade of loneliness, a thinning list of single men to know, a thinning brief-case of enthusiasm, thinning hair.”
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940)
“All is possible,
Who so list believe;
Trust therefore first, and after preve,
As men wed ladies by license and leave,
All is possible.”
—Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503?–1542)
“We’re definite in Nova Scotia—’bout things like ships ... and fish, the best in the world.”
—John Rhodes Sturdy, Canadian screenwriter. Richard Rossen. Joyce Cartwright (Ella Raines)
“It is from the blues that all that may be called American music derives its most distinctive character.”
—James Weldon Johnson (1871–1938)
“Why wont they let a year die without bringing in a new one on the instant, cant they use birth control on time? I want an interregnum. The stupid years patter on with unrelenting feet, never stopping—rising to little monotonous peaks in our imaginations at festivals like New Year’s and Easter and Christmas—But, goodness, why need they do it?”
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)