A Lovely Picnic
By Ryan Ringer
Much thanks to Suzanne Sutherland for bringing her Lovely Picnic music series to Project 165 this past weekend. It was a super-chill, positive afternoon of awesome folky brilliance – featuring Pat LePoidevin (now on tour across Canada), Sarah Keshen and Nathan Cyprys– and stellar audience participation to boot.
A special moment came as Pat – with surprising ease and charm – shoeless in black sock feat, strumming his wee ukulele, got the whole 30-person+ crowd to sing the chorus to one of his tunes. He even stepped outside to get everybody who had stopped to listen from the street to join in as well. And each time the chorus arose, there came a gentle surge of (dare I say) positive vibrations. … A big boyish-looking friendly guy, quiet, coming off as humbly thankful in the best possible way, Pat’s powerful voice and passionately heart-hitting lyrics gently shock and awe any enthusiastic listener into a genuine kind of man-I-gotta-get-this-guy’s-album feeling. It was a real treat to have him perform at Project 165 (not to mention Sarah and Nathan, who also gave exceptionally charming, powerful vocal performances).
If you get a chance to check out these acts – or to attend a Lovely Picnic event – do it!
April 13, 2010