This year marks the 20th anniversary of the award-winning Orangeville Blues and Jazz Festival as it runs from May 31st to June 2nd. The festival features a spectacular line-up of Canadian and International artists, but music is only part of the special event on the streets of Orangeville. Larry Kurtz, founder and Artistic Director of the festival dropped by to outline all the special events the festival has to offer.
Ken Wallis interviewed Larry Kurtz for the radio show BluesSource Canada. The following are excerpts from that interview, amended and edited for brevity and clarity.
Ken Wallis
It's the start of festival season in Ontario and first up is the Orangeville Blues and Jazz Festival, May 31st through June 2nd, and joining us to tell us all about it is Larry Kurtz, the founder and the artistic director of the Festival. Larry great seeing you.
Larry Kurtz
Yeah. Great to see you too, Ken. Excited to be here.
Ken Wallis
Well now there's an awful lot we got to talk about music-wise, but there's a lot of other things happening around this festival. Tell us about some of the other exciting events that are going on and then we'll talk music.
Larry Kurtz
Yeah, it all starts on Friday. We have our classic cars on the street. The whole downtown is shut to traffic and we have like 300 classic cars on the street, bands on the streets, you get to see people like Voodoo Pawn Shop and Son Roberts playing on the street as part of that event, so that usually attracts a lot of people. We get close to 10,000 people on the street just for that event, and that's all free.
Ken Wallis
And there's a lot more going on.
Larry Kurtz
There's a lot more going on. On Saturday we have a stage downtown and to kick off the day we have a New Orleans style jazz march. This year the band that’s doing the march is The Ghost Town Blues Band, which is going to be great. We have been trying to get Ghost Town for a while. I actually had them booked when Covid hit and due to scheduling conflicts, they were never able to make it until now. We're so happy they're going to be here and that’s on Saturday. We also have a farmers market if you get there early. We have bands on the street, but we also have activities for families, so there's some children's activities. You can go up and down the street, not just face painting, but there's art and there's entertainment for kids as well. All that is free on the street. And then on Sunday, we switch over to our motorcycle event. Again, we have bands on the street. Last year we had almost 1000 motorcycles on Sunday on the street. That really adds to the excitement when you see all these beauty bikes. It's a show and shine. There's a lot beyond that. There's workshops in the library which happy to say that you are part of this year so. Folks come out and see Ken is hosting a Women In Blues Workshop. Maybe you can tell them a little bit about it.
Ken Wallis
I'm really looking forward to that and we've got a pretty killer panel so far and I I'm adding some extra people, so it's going to be very exciting and we're basically going to talk about what it's like to be a female in the Blues world. And I'm not talking, just challenges. I'm talking the success stories because there are huge success stories. Larry walk us through some of the big bands. I know we can't cover them all. How many bands are gonna be there that week?
Larry Kurtz
We hire just under 50 acts for the festival. And then you add to that we have in restaurants and bars participating with music in the bars as well. So that brings us up to about 75 acts over the weekend. I always like to say if you're looking at an act and maybe it's not your cup of tea, just go down the street and you're going to find something else, it all happens simultaneously.
Ken Wallis
I always liken it to Hallowe’en. It's like trick or treat. You can just go from one venue to the next and get some more great music. So tell us about some of the big acts.
Larry Kurtz
There's free events on the street, you have Glenn Marais and Mojo train playing, Garnetta, Cromwell, Danny Marks, they're all free on that stage. In the park is our ticketed main stage and. headlining Friday night is Downchild Blues Band. On the same bill that night is Jack de Keyzer and opening up is, the Josh Miller and Pappy John's Band.
Then Saturday night, we have the Nick Moss Band from Chicago with Dennis Gruenling, one of the best harmonica players out there. Very excited about that. And we also have Angelina Hunter coming from Ottawa. And Brandon Isaak playing with a trio. The trio is Alex Fraser on bass and Steve Marriner on drums, so it's gonna be quite the band. We also have The SheWolves Of London on the bill and my own band, Larry Kurtz And The Lawbreakers. We have special guest Rick Taylor, who is always a blast.
When you buy a ticket to the main stage, which is the park behind the town hall, it gives you also free admission into the Opera House. And we have a a mixture of more acoustic Jazz and Blues in there. So on Sunday the Opera House you have a 45-piece gospel group, the Toronto Mass Choir, 45 singers on stage with the band. That's going to be at 12 noon, followed by Spencer Mackenzie with his band. And then a special show that I'm excited about is called Harps Of Gold. It's an All- Star band. Steve Mariners’ band basically. We have Jesse O'Brien and Gary Craig on drums and Jimmy Bowskill on guitar, so it's going to be a great band. It's featuring harmonica players. We have Steve Marriner, Paul Reddick, Jerome Godboo and myself, so it's going to be a a harp-off for sure. It will be fun. To close out the main stage, we are bringing in Dawn Tyler Watson with Ben Racine. We’re pretty excited about having Dawn Tyler Watson play at our festival. She's played here before, but not for a while, so we're happy to get her back. So, lots of lots of great stuff going on.
Ken Wallis
It sounds like a fantastic lineup, and I know you have been working for a long time to pull this off. Where do folks get tickets for the main events?
Larry Kurtz
This year tickets are at the unbelievable price of $20 per day, that's Friday. An individual ticket is $20 Saturday and then on Sunday they go down to $10. But we also have a weekend pass, and you can do all three days for a measly $40. And those tickets are available on our website so you can go to orangevillebluesandjazz.ca and you can buy tickets directly from there. Or if you're not doing the computer thing, you can just show up and buy them at the door. But you're taking your chances, we might be sold out.
Ken Wallis
I'm sure it's going to be busy. I know a lot of people have asked me are there chairs there that you can sit on, or should people bring their own?
Larry Kurtz
In that park, we provide bleachers, sort of behind the seating area. So those are available. But if you want a chair we recommend, bring a lawn chair, bring a low-rise lawn chair and that's the way we do the seating. The seating is on grass in a park, lots of trees. It's a beautiful setting. So bring your own chairs and if you don't, if you forget, we do have bleachers.
Ken Wallis
Again, it's the 20th anniversary that's hard to believe.
Larry Kurtz
Yeah. Well, it's going strong. We have a really good group of 250 volunteers this year.
So when you see people in the orange shirts be sure to thank them. They're really helping make sure that everybody is comfortable, and everything's taken care of. We have a great board of directors. We're not-for-profit, so all the money goes directly back into the community. We did a survey with the province using their model and measuring our economic impact and the the festival brings in about $2.5 million per year to the local economy. It’s beyond having great music, it's really good for our economy, and like you say, everybody has a great time.
Ken Wallis
Well, Larry, I thank you so much for your time.
Larry Kurtz
Thanks a lot, Ken, we'll see you there.
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