Since October 2019, I have been working for the Quebec Anglophone Heritage Network on a Canadian Heritage-funded called “A Different Tune: Musical Heritage in English-Speaking Quebec.” It’s a survey of the diverse grassroots musical cultures across Quebec’s English-speaking communities, both rural and urban.

This past March, I was en route to Shigawake and Gaspé when Premier Legault announced a state of emergency due to the Covid-19 pandemic. A few months earlier, I had reached out to Dave Felker of the Bonaventure County Agricultural Society to put together a series of music videos of local songwriters from the Baie-des-Chaleurs communities who have written songs about the area. The idea was to release these videos in the weeks leading up to the annual Shigawake Fair and Music Festival which takes place in mid-August. We had planned to dedicate the opening night of music to these local songwriters and their songs of the Coast.

As I was making my way east last March, listening to the radio, it was clear the situation on the ground was changing so fast. After a few days in Quebec City I turned around and headed back to Montreal, indefinitely postponing my Gaspé trip. By May, every live music event in Quebec had been cancelled for at least the next six months and both Dave and I were regrouping to adapt to the new socially distant reality, working on our respective projects to deliver local musical programming using live streaming services.

Dave is currently leading a project for CASA called, The Gaspesian Way, which seeks to create an inventory of English-speaking artists, artisans, and their products on the Coast to help develop the local cultural milieu and increase tourist attraction to their communities. Tonight, we sat down 1000 km apart on Facebook Live, and discussed our upcoming weekly “Thirsty Thursday” livestreams of local Gaspesian music.

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Join us this Thursday at 8 pm at on the Facebook Live (details below) to hear Nadine Landry and Sammy Lind, an old-time country and cajun duo living in Pointe-à-la-Croix. They will bringing you a full hour of music from their living room to yours. Nadine grew up in a musical family on the Gaspé Coast before heading out West. Sammy Lind is originally from Minnesota but lived for many years in Portland, Oregon where he was a staple of the old-time country and square dance scene, founding The Foghorn Stringband, one of the best known old-time stringbands in the U.S. and Canada. In 2016, Nadine and Sammy moved back to the Gaspé Coast, their current home-base when they are not touring the globe either as a duo or with the Foghorn Stringband. Together, they play fiddle tunes, early country and Cajun songs, alternating between fiddle, banjo, guitar and accordion.

To tune into the broadcast, simply visit either one of the two following Facebook pages (you don’t need an account to watch) every Thursday at 8pm:

https://www.facebook.com/adifferenttune/live/

https://www.facebook.com/thegaspesianway/live

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Check out Sammy and Nadine’s webpage here for more music: http://www.nadineandsammy.com/about-us/