Husband and wife duo John and Lisa McLaggan have only known each other as musicians, having met as music students. Now, as Tomato/Tomato, they’re coming to perform their folk music in Tisdale.
They’ll play at the Maurice Taylor Performing Arts Theatre March 2 at 7:30 p.m.
Yet they didn’t start as a band playing their own twist on folk, bluegrass, blues and swing.
“When we first started to play music together, we were a jazz duo,” Lisa said. “I was playing piano and singing, and he was playing saxophone.”
Yet the shift to the genre of music they play now made sense.
“The kind of music we were listening to constantly and that we were singing around the house was rootsy, kind of folk music, so I think it was only natural to start diving into that since that’s what we loved at the time.”
The couple first started performing folk music around their home in Saint John, N.B., where they played for tips with an open guitar case at farmers’ markets.
“The first time we started playing folk music at a venue, we only had five or six cover songs that we had prepared and we had a jazz gig that we were doing,” Lisa said. “We asked the owner if we could re-set our stage for a folk set at the very end of the night, just a couple of songs.”
The owner said they could.
“The people that were listening were really into it, so right from the get-go, we were getting a positive response and we were having so much fun.”
After a while, the duo was becoming more successful in Saint John.
“We were starting to get more work here locally and realized we were just going by the John and Lisa Duo as our name, so we thought we needed a band name,” Lisa said.
So they sat around with some friends, tossed out ideas and had narrowed it down to two names – names that Lisa now can’t recall.
“We said, ‘what do you guys think? This one or that one?’ and a buddy of ours just said, ‘I don’t know guys. It’s to-may-to/to-maw-to, so whatever.’ We were like, ‘it is to-may-to/to-maw-to. That works perfectly for us.’”
Tomato/Tomato worked because it captured the nature of their personalities. Back then, they were also playing jazz and folk, so it also captured the two genres.
The band has two albums, won three New Brunswick Music awards in 2015, and was nominated for East Coast Music Association awards for roots/traditional album of the year in 2015, fan choice video of the year in 2016 and songwriter of the year in 2017.
Lisa said audience members can expect their show to be like an east coast kitchen party, where audience members will have a good time clapping their hands and stomping their feet. The audience will see the duo harmonizing together, and will see Lisa multitasking, playing drums and washboard, singing, and banging on tin cans all at the same time.
They’ll also play music from their new album, which has been recorded but not yet released.
“They’re in for a treat,” Lisa said. “They’re going to have everything at the kitchen party but the sink.”
The musician said people should come to their show because it’s a positive experience with live music and they’ll leave happier than when they arrived.
This is the first time the couple have toured rural Saskatchewan.
“We’re really looking forward to it,” Lisa said. “It’s a big chunk of the country that we have yet to explore, so we’re excited to see it and we want to see the communities, meet everybody and make new friends.”
Tomato/Tomato will perform at the Maurice Taylor Performing Arts Theatre March 2 at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are available at the Clothesline and ticketpro.ca.
