WEYBURN – One of the most recognized Canadian country acts of the past two decades, Doc Walker, will be the first featured performers for the Weyburn Concert Series for the 2021-22 season.
Doc Walker will put on an acoustic show on Monday, Nov. 8 at 7:30 p.m. at the Cugnet Centre, helping the popular entertainment series to resume after taking a hiatus last year due to COVID concerns.
Chris Thorsteinson and his longtime singing partner, Dave Wasyliw, natives of Westbourne, Man., will be coming to Weyburn after performing at the casino in Winnipeg with their full band.
In many ways, said Thorsteinson, the stripped-down acoustic shows are more intimate and usually played in smaller venues, and this format allows them to share some of the stories behind the songs, as well as anecdotes from two decades of touring around Canada performing their music.
“We do a lot of these acoustic shows. We’ve been doing them for quite a while,” he said, noting that he and Dave do most of the songwriting for their group, so they’re able to share a lot of what went into the songs.
The pair are looking forward to the show also because after a year and a half of no performing live, other than online, it’s nice to get out and meet people and sing for them, he said. “We miss interacting with the fans. We always like the feedback. We’ve done the online shows, but it’s never the same as sitting on a stage performing in front of the people.”
Stories from the road also come up a lot, he added, sometimes as a place or song will bring up a memory of an incident he had forgotten about from 10 years before.
An example of one of the stories was how they came up with the song “North Dakota Boy”, which they wrote after doing a show in that state.
“It was written after we got fired from the Flying J Truck Stop, because we didn’t know any good rock songs that they wanted to hear. That night we rented the movie ‘Fargo’ from the front desk, and we ended up writing this song about a guy in North Dakota while we were in North Dakota,” he said, adding, “There are so many stories like that.”
One of their new songs, “She Wants What She Wants”, was written before COVID hit, but they’ve had a year and a half to work on it and polish it up, which Thorsteinson said was an unexpected luxury for them, rather than when they often did a song up to meet a deadline.
“We usually try to interact with the crowd. You can really develop a rapport with the fans. It’s a lot of fun,” said Thorsteinson, noting they will at times take requests from fans, and they always try to mix up the song list from show to show.
“We’re really excited to bring the shows to Saskatchewan. We kind of got our start in Saskatoon. Saskatchewan is kind of a second home for us,” he said.
Those wishing to attend this or other Concert Series shows need to know that the Concert Series will require proof of vaccination or a negative COVID test to enter the auditorium, as per the recently-introduced provincial regulations.
The next show in the series will be singer Chantal Kreviazuk, who will put on her Christmas show on Monday, Nov. 22, at 7:30 p.m., the final show for 2021.
Tickets are available at Old Fashion Foods, the Weyburn Review office or online at www.weyburnconcertseries.ca.
