Each year musicians gather at Moose Mountain Provincial Park for the Kenosee Lake Kitchen Party (KLKP), which offers music camps for people of all ages and abilities on various instruments.
Michele Amy, a resident of the tiny village of Forget, is the founder of the camp, and a renowned fiddle player and instructor. So it’s no surprise that fiddle classes would be offered at the camp each year.
Now Amy is preparing to take some of the top fiddlers from this year’s camp to Cape Breton for a top international festival.
Fourteen teenagers and three instructors – the majority of whom attended this year’s KLKP – will travel to Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, from Oct. 6 to 14 for the Celtic Colours festival.
“We’re going to Cape Breton to share our music and to learn the music on the East Coast, so it’s an appropriate venture for something like this,” she said.
Most of the members from the group are from southeast Saskatchewan. Madison Zandee and Michaela Zatko are from Estevan. Morgan Robertson hails from Carlyle, McKenna Harkness is from Arcola, Gavin Fleck comes from Lampman, Micah Walbaum lives in Forget, Jenelle Breault is from Stoughton and Shoni King hails from Corning.
The remaining members live outside of the province. They include Natalie Krause, Tremaine Sutherland, River North, Cara Boardman, Cal Boardman and Tom Gammons. They hail from Manitoba, Alberta or Montana.
The instructors will be Michele Amy, Donna Turk and Jacquie Walbaum.
Amy said it’s not difficult to bring together these performers.
“The fiddle community, we’re far-flung, but we tend to mostly know each other,” said Amy. “When you start playing a traditional musical instrument and you travel the country, as professionals, we get to know each other and we see each other at various events, camps, concerts and showcases, and what not.”
Young players are much the same, she said, and so they get to know the community of fiddlers.
“When we get together, we have a common set of tunes that we play, we have a common musical language, we all enjoy a similar feel to the music and attitude about the music itself and function about the music,” said Amy.
The students who live outside of the southeast receive a sound file, so that when they get to Cape Breton, they can play all the songs as a cohesive unit.
“We have that kind of dedication in these young musicians, so they’re not standing on the sidelines, and letting everyone play without them,” said Amy. “They’re willing to do the work so they can jump right in there and play along.”
Zatko has been playing the fiddle for six years. She started playing the fiddle after she couldn’t play the violin, and has loved playing the fiddle. The KLKP has helped develop her love of the instrument.
“It’s so much fun,” said Zatko. “All the different instructors are really fun, but I also love how we get to go kayaking in our free time. All the concerts every night are so cool with all the different instructors playing songs.”
The Celtic Colours festival features musicians from around the world. Small towns and communities all over the island will have concerts and other events.
Amy called it a celebration of culture, language and the Highland way of life.
“We’ve rented a couple of a large houses, and I’ve hired teachers, some of the most amazing staff ever, so for four mornings that we’re there, all of these students will have instruction by some of the world’s best Celtic artists,” said Amy.
The youths will also attend dance workshops, play at open mic sessions and community events, and tour numerous historical sites.
She expects the festival will really enhance the musicians’ development.
“It’s about tuning our ears,” said Amy. “The best way to learn a language is to plop yourself down in the middle of a culture where that’s the only language that people speak,” she said.
“In a fairly quick amount of time, our ears tune to the language and the accents and the way that language is used and the way the phrasing is done, and it’s more than we can ever learn by looking at books and looking at words on the page.”
Zatko believes it will be a great experience to go to Cape Breton, and to see the scenery and experience the culture.
“It will be really cool to hear all of those famous Cape Breton fiddlers,” said Zatko.
The fiddle workshops with the top performers will be a great experience in particular, she said.
Zatko expects it will help with her development as a musician.
“It’s like a different culture out there,” said Zatko. “The music is different than it is out here … so it will be good to hear some Cape Breton-style music.”
The young people have been hosting fundraisers to offset the costs of the trip to Cape Breton. The last of the fundraisers was an old-time dance in Corning, northeast of Stoughton, on Sept. 23. The students supplied music to the delight of the people in attendance.
“It was exactly what you would imagine for an old-time dance back in the day, with the village hall and the people coming in after work, and having a great dance,” said Amy.
The kids are well-versed in the dance traditions of the Prairies as well, Amy said, so they demonstrated the various dances. Amy is encouraged to see the way in which the youths embrace musical traditions.
Amy noted the students had five larger fundraisers and a few smaller ones. They had a large dance at the Red Barn near Kenosee Lake, and several concerts and performances at smaller gatherings like nursing homes.
