When the Kingsville Folk Music Festival kicks off next month, it'll feature the sounds of the Smokey Mountains with a distinctly urban Canadian twist.
Toronto's Slocan Ramblers will bring their brand of bluegrass to the festival at Lakeside Park.
The Slocan Ramblers (Photo courtesy of www.SlocanRamblers.com)
With Frank Evans on banjo, Adrian Gross on mandolin, Darryl Poulson on guitar, and Alastair Whitehead on bass, the band got its start seven years ago.
"Couple of us went to music school in Toronto together, and a couple of the guys kinda met through the Toronto music scene," says Whitehead. "We'd all been going to similar shows around Toronto and checking out music and struck up a friendship."
Whitehead admits it may be an unlikely fit for a couple of music school grads, but says the music is challenging, requiring a rare proficiency with the instrument.
"A few of us went to school for jazz," he says. "There's a lot of similarities. A lot of people don't think of it, but between jazz and bluegrass there's a lot of improvisation, a lot of soloing and you have to have a technique to keep up."
Very soon after, the foursome earned a gig at the popular Cloak and Dagger Irish Pub not far from the campus of the University of Toronto.
"It was a pretty casual thing at first. We were all just getting into bluegrass and wanted an outlet to play music," says Whitehead. "It was a lot of fun. It got to be quite a big weekly event."
Queen City Jubiliee by the Slocan Ramblers. (Photo courtesy of www.SlocanRamblers.com)
While you may not typically think of Toronto as being a hotbed of bluegrass music, Whitehead says the scene has been growing, thanks in part to the continued popularity of country music.
"Country's maybe a gate-way into bluegrass," suggests Whitehead. "I think people are maybe a little scared of the banjo and have some preconceived notions about what bluegrass is -- but if we can get them out to the show then once they see it they think 'oh, yeah' this is just a lot of music I like in a format that's fun to watch."
Unlike today's country scene, the Slocan Ramblers offer a rougher, more traditional sound much more reminiscent of the genre's roots.
The band, which released its third album "Queen City Jubilee" just last month, is scheduled to play August 12.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cc4kJ5zmPCs