Music is best served... LIVE!
Central Music Festival Society is recruiting the next generation of live music enthusiasts. We want to keep bringing great acts to Red Deer and featuring local local talent, both as opening acts and headliners. Our goal is to become more diverse, more inclusive and to build on the past decade and a half (or so) and to continue to pursue our mission. Want to help? Click here.
Hank Lionhart image
The Blue Hearts
MARK "WESTCOAST" COMERFORD
Blues guitarist, singer and songwriter, Mark “West Coast” Comerford came by his love of music early. He grew up in Victoria in the 60s with older musician brothers and hardly a day went by in which he didn’t hear blues, folk music or rock being played live in the house or on vinyl 45s, 78s and LPs.
He started on guitar and banjo but guitar was his main instrument. After high-school he and drummer Marcus Hondro joined up with experienced bass player John Fisher. They played blues by Muddy Waters, Little Walter and Paul Butterfield and began writing their own material.
Mark ran an ad in the paper and answering was Hank Lionhart, a singer from Alberta who'd played in Hot Cottage and other bands and who'd just moved to the city. Lionhart brought Norm Piercy, a veteran Victoria bass player onboard and Piercy brought along saxophone player Brent Hutchinson. Uncle Wiggly's Hot Shoes Blues Band was born.
He became part of an Uncle Wiggly's Hot Shoes Blues Band revival, the band playing prominent blues clubs and music festivals in Western Canada. In 2015 they won the right to compete as BC's entry The International Blues Challenge, which takes place yearly in Memphis. Comerford soaked up the music in the Memphis and Delta area. As a duo, he and Leonhart returned the next year and the year after.
Over 40 years later and he still loves it as much as he ever did and appreciates even more.
BIG HANK LIONHART
Hank's singing career began in High School in Edmonton, 1964. After graduation and a move to Seattle he formed a band called the Clouds. They had a coveted house gig at the legendary Door Night Club for over 9 months. Hank left the Clouds and Seattle behind and journeyed back to Canada where he landed in Edmonton once again.
Hank sang for many top forty bands in the Capital City and toured all over Western Canada, eventually ending up in Victoria where he founded Uncle Wiggly's Hot Shoes Blues Band with Mark "Westcoast" Comerford and bass player, Norm Piercy. The band had a moderate amount of success recording two Albums, being signed to KCA Records and touring across the country, opening for Muddy Waters and Joe Locker multiple times, as well as George Thorogood and many more. Uncle Wiggly's competed at the International Blues Challenge in Memphis in 2015 in the band category and Mark and Hank as the Blue Hearts competed two more times in the solo duo category making it to the semi finals. Hank spent over 20 years in Vancouver where he played with the R&B Toasters, and the Kingpins for many years where they were a mainstay in the vibrant R&B Scene especially during Expo 86 where he and the band opened for the Neville Brothers. Hank has recorded over 14 CDs in a 60 year career. He continues to write and record and still does some touring. His love for the Blues is alive and well and like he always says... Keep it Live
ANDY GRAFFITI
Born in Vancouver, drummer Andy Graffiti has been engaged in making visual, verbal and aural art for decades. After participating in the then-vibrant Victoria music scene of the late 70s, he returned to Vancouver and became a well-known and respected figure in the alternative music community during the 1980s, working with local and national players and songwriters in many genres. In the latter part of that decade he began to work in professional theatre throughout Western Canada, as a musician and sound designer. In the early 90s he began to focus on the Blues, and continued to tour extensively through most of the decade. Now residing again in Victoria, Graffiti has been active in music there since 2010. Among the artists he has played and/or recorded with: The Actionauts, AKA Wille P. Bennett, Riley bent, Art Bergman, The Beverly Sisters, The Blue Hearts, Bolero lava, Buddy Selfish and His Saviours, Jack De Keyser, Morgan Davis, DOA, Dogskin Suit, The Dots, Sherman Doucette, Du-Rite Aces, Big Joe Duskin, Amos Garrett.
DON MARCOTTE
Completing the band is Edmonton bassist “Doghouse” Donnie Marcotte. From North Bay, Ontario, Donnie has been a fixture on the Alberta music scene for the past few decades and has worked with noted blues players such as Dutch Mason, Hock Walsh (Downchild Blues Band) Lionel Rault, Tony D, and Rusty Reed, Calvin Valrath & Country Swing. Don brings his country and roots influences to the band as well and is looking forward to reuniting with his pal Big hank and the Blue Hearts.
We play Traditional Finger Pickin Blues Standards and Originals.
https://www.facebook.com/theblueheartsduo
Victoria BC
The Blue Hearts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttPn2JVpImw
Up on Cripple Creek
with John York october 10
General Admission Doors at 7, Music at 8
John York
Up on Cripple Creek
Just over a decade ago a seven-member edition of Front Porch Roots Revue ran the show Up On Cripple Creek: The Songbook of “The Band” up the flagpole to what was an enthusiastic response from fans of The Band and venue and festival producers.
Since that time the ensemble has come together every few years to play festival, theatre and cabaret dates around Alberta and B.C..
Armed with songs from all the great Band albums, this troupe dishes out authentic and soulful renditions of Band classics like The Weight, Stage Fright, Across the Great Divide, Shape I’m In, It Makes No Difference, Ophelia, When I Paint My Masterpiece, and The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down.
Up On Cripple Creek boasts five strong singers, led by Calgary’s JR Shore and Doug Andrew from Vancouver’s Circus In Flames.
Bassist and vocalist Ron Rault, long time Ian Tyson drummer Thom Moon, Calgary keyboard ace Garth Kennedy, the great Gord Matthews on guitar and harmonica player and vocalist Crawdad Cantera are all key players in this project.
John Manuel, a former roadie for The Band and brother of The Band’s late-lead singer Richard Manuel, caught the show at the Vancouver Island Music Festival and stated, “I never thought I’d hear the music of The Band played so well again.”
For the fall 2024 string of dates Up On Cripple Creek will be presenting The Music of The Band, Bob Dylan and The Byrds with very special guest, John York.
York, a onetime member of the legendary Byrds joined Roger McGuinn, Clarence White and Gene Parsons just as the group was touring the fabled Sweetheart of the Rodeo album. York toured extensively with The Byrds and is heard on the recordings, Dr. Byrds and Mr. Hyde and Ballad of Easy Rider, on which he contributed vocals, bass and original songs. York can also be heard on The Byrds Live at the Fillmore album which was released a few years ago after being in the CBS vaults for a few decades.
A few years later York found himself in an all-star ensemble that included Rick Danko and Richard Manuel of The Band, and Byrds founding member Gene Clark.
“Of course we played a lot of Band tunes alongside the Byrds and Dylan tunes, it was a special time. I think I’ll feel right at home working with this project that is mining these songs,” says York who worked on a series of dates with Matthews, Moon, and Cantera just before the pandemic hit. York also enjoyed a string of sold-out solo shows on Vancouver Island and the lower mainland this past spring.
Show producer Peter North says, “This will be another memorable edition of the Up On Cripple Creek show and with John York on board it broadens the palette and gives fans some new takes on timeless material.
“These will also be the first dates for Up On Cripple Creek since the group played the inaugural Dead Ends Live Festival a couple of years ago and that show was met with a thunderous response in the Chateau Lacombe Ballroom,” added North of the project that is an offshoot of Front Porch Roots Revue.
Out of the gate the Calgary Herald called the project “one of the best 15 shows of the year”. Up On Cripple Creek has rocked many a venue including the Vancouver Island Music Fest, Salmon Arm Roots and Blues Festival, The North Country Fair, Festival Place in Sherwood Park, Calgary’s Ironwood Stage and Grill, Elks Hall in Red Deer, The Capitol Theatre in Nelson, Kicking Cultural Centre in Golden and the Butchart Gardens Concert Bowl in Victoria.
To quote Allison Brock of CKUA’s Wide Cut Country, “it’s as if the Front Porch boys and are channeling The Band in Up On Cripple Creek. It’s an incredible night”.
Up On Cripple Creek with Special Guest John York presents: The Music of The Band, Bob Dylan and The Byrds
JOHN YORK
For over five decades John York has been making music that is stitched into the foundation of what is known today as Americana music. Best known for his work as a member of The Byrds, this guitar and bass playing singer-songwriter was in the midst of some of the timeless music created in the sixties and seventies.
After stints as a session man working with the likes of The Mamas and The Papas, Johnny Rivers and the Doug Sahm led-Sir Douglas Quintet, York joined The Byrds when founding bass player Chris Hillman exited the group to form the Flying Burrito Brothers. York found himself in a legendary group piloted by Byrds founder Roger McGuinn that also included the brilliant guitar player Clarence White and drummer/singer Gene Parsons.
York’s vocal and song-writing contributions to The Byrds were first heard on the Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde album, and then the Ballad of Easy Rider recording. Songs from the two albums included Byrds classics like Drug Store Truck Drivin’ Man, This Wheel’s On Fire, Ballad of Easy Rider, Gunga Din, Deportee, and Jesus Is Just Alright as well as the York-penned tunes Fido, and Candy, the latter of which was used in the movie soundtrack of the same name.
At the same time York was knee deep in playing the cream of a deep Byrds catalogue that was eventually issued on the Columbia album Live At The Fillmore. The album showcases what would have been recently released material from Dr. Byrds and its predecessor, the classic Sweetheart of the Rodeo. Early Byrds material like So You Want To Be A Rock ‘N Roll Star, Chimes of Freedom and This Wheel’s On Fire, is also front and centre on the disc.
“We also recorded a fine medley that stitched together Turn, Turn, Turn, with Mr. Tambourine Man, and Eight Miles High,” says York before adding, “that line-up of The Byrds was considered by critics and fans to be an excellent live performing unit.”
Half a century later the songs of The Byrds, some penned by Bob Dylan, have proven to be timeless and some of the most important from the heyday of rock and roll and country-rock music.
York continues to keep these songs alive with his fine singing that finds the emotional essence of what made The Byrds vocals so unique and instantly recognizable.
York also spent a number of years working with his long-time friend Barry McGuire, of Eve of Destruction fame, on a show titled Trippin’ The Sixties. Their touring show was very popular, taking the two around the world, and was captured by PBS for major fundraising campaigns that are still aired today.
“Barry retired before the pandemic, but we both loved playing on the songs we had a hand in creating, as well as covering so many of the classics from that era. I still do at least one Beatles tune in my shows and sometimes I do an entire evening of Dylan songs,” says York with a smile.
Today York can be found performing evenings of Dylan and Byrds tunes with a couple of newer originals thrown in for good measure.
“I was also in a band with Rick Danko and Richard Manuel after The Band broke up so I’ve been known to do a few Band tunes, and I sang This Wheel’s On Fire with The Byrds. Gene Clark and Michael Clarke, who were founding members of The Byrds, also invited me into the final version of The Byrds in the eighties, so I have a lot of Gene’s tunes in my repertoire as well.”
With the recent passing of David Crosby, and Chris Hillman having retired from touring, Byrds founder Roger McGuinn and John York are the only two of the 11 musicians who recorded as The Byrds for Columbia Records, still on the road.
John continues to collaborate with friends and a great example is on Carla Olson’s outstanding release Have Harmony, Will Travel. John sings lead on 2 songs, First In Line and Upon A Painted Ocean. He also played guitar on the Richie Furay/Carla Olson version of Gene Clark’s masterpiece She Don’t Care About Time.
York’s last performances in Canada were a few months before the pandemic when he played a series of dates in Alberta. Some were solo and others found him being backed by an all-star band that included veterans from k.d. lang’s reclines and Ian Tyson’s Chinook Arch Riders.
John York continues to deliver great songs, from a great era, with soulful and passionate performances.
For more info
Tony D
Elks Lodge November 16
General Admission Doors at 7, Music at 8
This just in - Tony D’s Electric Delta album release tour will be live At The Elks Lodge on November 16!
August 16, 2024 - Acclaimed guitarist and blues musician Tony D is thrilled to announce his forthcoming album, "Electric Delta" set to be released on November 1 via Cordova Bay Records. Fans can get a first taste of the album today with the release of the debut single, “Modern Times”.
Reflecting on the inspiration behind “Modern Times”, Tony D shares, "I miss the culture of discovering music and finding it and hunting it down. It was an art form. We weren’t as easily distracted.”
With a career spanning over four decades, Tony D has cemented his status as a leading figure in the blues scene. He has honed his craft alongside legends like Buddy Guy and Stevie Ray Vaughan, drawing inspiration from icons like Muddy Waters and Jimi Hendrix.
Tony's extensive experience includes 15 years as the lead guitarist for the award-winning band MonkeyJunk, with whom he garnered multiple Juno Awards and Maple Blues Awards. Electric Delta represents a new chapter in Tony D's musical journey. The album promises a fusion of original blues material infused with the electric energy of his diverse influences.
Following the success of his 2020 instrumental compilation "SPEAK NO EVIL" and a busy 2023 filled with touring and producing, Tony is eager to share this latest project with audiences worldwide. Tony D will be extensively touring Canada and beyond in 2024 and 2025, bringing his signature brand of blues to fans new and old.
About Tony D:
Tony began his musical journey learning blues, rock and jazz guitar by studying any vinyl record he could get his hands on. By his late teens he was making a living in a band full time, playing 3 nights of rhythm guitar for Buddy Guy and opening for Stevie Ray Vaughan at the NAC in Ottawa. Over his career he has recorded 7 indie solo albums as the Tony D Band and has had the opportunity to record with many other Canadian talents like Dutch Mason, David Wilcox and Suzie Vinnick. He has spent the last 15 years as the lead guitarist for the Juno and Maple Blues award winning band MonkeyJunk.
In 2020 Tony released, SPEAK NO EVIL, a compilation of instrumentals that span his career.
