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In the spirit of a musical
report from the ‘colonies’ (although there are no colonies any more,
and little of its former interest remains in the ‘report for afar’
when all that was once far is now so near!) I am pleased to say that
I recently welcomed a fellow former Irish showband ‘head’, Dublin
drummer Shay Murphy (Gentry, Purple Pussycat, Hoedowners), to
the pit band of the Giggledam Musical Comedy Dinner Theatre in Port
Coquitlam British Columbia.
In fact Shay and I are the pit band in this endeavour which is
labelled, quite frankly as “the last politically incorrect place
on Earth”. This has been my regular keyboard gig since the
summer of 2005. When our usual drummer - a young powerhouse
‘knockthepaintoffthemcans’ basher-artist named Clayton Hill -
took off for his first love rock band summer touring gig with
Canadian icons Trooper, I thought to give Shay a call. He
lives in North Vancouver and I live in White Rock – the opposite
ends of that soon-to-be sprawling metropolis known as the Greater
Vancouver Area. It turned out he was not only willing to do the gig
but was already teaching regularly in the vicinity of the
above-mentioned theatre, and pretty much already on hand for the
weekly Friday/Saturday tandem that makes up the time commitment.
This troupe is a motley crew indeed. There are six
actor/singer/dancer/comedians on stage and two of us in the pit. Of
the actors, three (the girls) are enthusiastic new twenty-somethings,
recent graduates of a renowned local college theatre program. The
other three are our core late thirties/early forties male cast
comprising theatre owner/comedian extraordinaire Mark Friebe,
promotions manager/actor/musician Brad Lovell and
actor/comedian Jon Lundquist. These are all very talented and
original performers, and the shows still give me enough of a laugh
every night I’d almost (but not quite) work for free! Shay has fit
right in with the pacing and dynamics that are so important to this
show, as well as with the requirement that – whatever else - you
never take yourself too seriously!
Audiences are pre-booked, seated and sell-out (200) most nights and
there is no waiting around for a crowd to gather (maybe this is
payback for 30 years ‘in the business’?).
I happened on the IrishShowbands.Net website the other night and -
coming over a bit nostalgic - started to ponder on a long road that
led from Dublin in the seventies to Port Coquitlam some thirty-plus
years later, and how strange and pleasant it is to have a fellow
Irishman and former band-head kicking it out rock-solid behind me
every night in the summer of 2007. (Check out giggledam.com for
more!)
© Eamonn Morris 20057
© Irish Showbands Archive 2007
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