Community spotlight: Bring your voice – doesn’t have to be in tune – and sing loud and proud in tribute to Stompin’ Tom Connors

In this time of heightened awareness of our Canadian identity, no one sang the praises of this country more loudly than Stompin’ Tom Connors.

And this Saturday at Port Stanley Festival Theatre, enjoy Whiskey Jack: The Stories and Songs of Stompin’ Tom.

Whisky Jack band leader Duncan Fremlin is more than a fan, he toured with the unabashed Canadian ambassador.

From Bud The Spud to Tillsonburg to The Hockey Song, Troubadour Tom had a song heralding just about everything we love about this country.

Whisky Jack has been making music for five decades and in the 1980’s the band was invited to host their own “Ol’ Back Porch” segment on CBC TV’s Tommy Hunter Show.

In 1990 Tom made the group one of his studio and touring bands and that partnership lasted for almost a quarter of a century before Connor’s death in 2014.

Today, Fremlin is joined by two-time Juno nominee, Douglas John Cameron and Stompin’ Tom’s favourite PEI fiddler, Billy MacInnis, to take the music “to an entirely different level.”

And with Tom, recalled Fremlin, it was all about his boot as he recounts a particular Canada Day concert in Ottawa.

“Well, I wrote a book called My Good Times with Stompin’ Tom, and I tell the story in there about when you’re in a Stompin’ Tom band, normally if you were to, you know, if you’re playing in a Gordon Lightfoot band or an Anne Murray band, then the band plays and the singer sings to the band.

“In a Stompin’ Tom band, the other way around, the band played to Tom. So as the boot was going, that’s where we went.

“And there were times in the middle of songs, in fact, when we did our first show with Tom in 1993, it was on Parliament Hill in front of, you know, hundreds of thousands of flag-waving Canadians on July 1st.

“So in the middle of that show, you know, the crowd was so loud that we had to follow the boot to find out where we were in the song because we just didn’t know. But that boot, it may not have had the best timing all the time. It may not have been like a clock. But we always knew where Tom was singing because he was singing to the boot.”

So, what’s in store Saturday at Port Stanley Festival Theatre?

It’s all about the stories, stressed Fremlin.

“Whiskey Jack is taking his songs and we’re singing them as we learned them from him, in our own way, with our own instrumentation, with our own arrangements.

“I was told on Friday by a guy who doesn’t even like country music, he said, you have made this music palatable and enjoyable for anybody and everybody, regardless of their musical taste.

“And that was the ultimate compliment to me, because for me, the Tom magic is his songs.”

Get caught up in the stories and songs of Stompin’ Tom this Saturday at Port Stanley Festival Theatre with shows at 2 and 7:30 p.m. For more information and tickets, visit Whiskey Jack Stories & Songs of Stompin’ Tom – Port Stanley Festival Theatre

Written by Ian McCallum