Two Canadian country crooners have paired up to bring festive cheer across Canada, including a stop in Fort Frances.
George Canyon and Aaron Pritchett are stopping for a show at the Townshend Theatre on Dec. 2 and are bringing along some country flavoured Yuletide tunes, along with a few of their classic hits.
The Fort Frances Times caught up with Canyon and Pritchett as they rode their tour bus between Summerside, P.E.I., and Quebec City.
According to the performers, the fact that they are longtime friends made the decision to go on tour together an easy one.
“First of all we’ve known each other for close to 30 years, we’ve done a few of these shows individually but never as a tour,” Pritchett said.
“So it was pretty easy to come to the decision that we’d do a little tour together and it’s turned out to be quite a big tour so far.”
The tour started Nov. 12 in Windsor, N.S., Canyon’s home province, before snaking its way westward to B.C., where the tour wraps up in Sidney on Vancouver Island on Dec. 23.
“Christmas is our favourite time of year,” Canyon added.
“I think both of us love Christmas equally. It brings back many fond memories when we were kids and growing up in the 70s. So we just kind of have so much in common when it comes to being raised and how important Christmas was. Getting to share that with all the fans is pretty special.”
Country music lovers coming out to the tour will get a taste of Christmas flavour, as well as some of Canyon and Pritchett’s country classics.
“People ask me what type of show is my favourite,” Pritchett said.
“And I say the acoustic ones, where we not only just get to really strip down our songs, but we get to tell the stories and interact with the crowd. It’s such an amazing experience, and quite funny, there’s a lot of stories about both of our careers and personal lives that are very parallel and very similar, but they have a lot of humour to them as well. So we finally get to do that sort of a show where people are sitting there listening intently and get to tell the stories. I think that’s one of the greatest things. Also playing Christmas songs, you don’t get to do that all year at all. So we get to play some of our favourite Christmas songs, and we’ve even made a recording of eight songs, of our favourite Christmas songs, and even one that George and a friend named Kenny Hess wrote together. It’s definitely an experience that’s different from any other you’ve ever seen. And we’ve got our ‘hit songs,’ we’ve got a bunch of hit songs, and we’re able to play a bunch of those, but mix them in with the Christmas songs as well.”
Canyon and Pritchett have partnered with the charity Children Believe for the tour. According to its website, Children Believe is a charity that “creates a future of hope for children, families, and communities by helping them develop the skills and resources to overcome poverty and injustice.”
During the show Canyon and Pritchett will discuss their recent trip to Ghana, West Africa, where they saw the charity’s work in person.
“We’ve got Nico with us from Children Believe, on the tour, so people can actually get to talk to him,” Canyon said.
“They can also watch a video that was shot of Aaron and I when they come to the theatre. Then we have a very special gift, if you make a donation of a minimum of $20 to Children Believe you get a gift that’s the Christmas record that Aaron and I have created.”
The record was produced by Pritchett’s son and is only available on CD at the show. If you don’t have a CD player there will be a unique, non-transferable download code inside the CD as well.
This will be both performers’ first time performing in Fort Frances. However, Pritchett was here once before, but he was playing hockey as part of a celebrity charity game.
While it might feel a little early for Christmas to some, Canyon says that once the show gets going everyone is in the holiday spirit.
“We’re just excited, the tour takes on kind of its own thing, and we knew that would happen. Usually it takes a while to sink in. We sunk in after two shows,” Canyon said.
“It’s so much fun, and we have so much fun with the crowd, and we’re just really looking forward to it. I know it’s early for Christmas for a lot of people, but once you get there, the way we kind of weave the Christmas songs through our own songs, by the time everybody’s done, they’re singing silent night to the top of their lungs.”
Brought to Fort Frances by Tour De Fort, remaining tickets for Coast-to-Coast Cowboy Christmas are limited. There are still some available online at tourdefort.com, at Ski’s Variety or at the Fort Frances Public Library.
