Sunday, 25 June — Port Hood¹

I arose well after 10h to a beautiful, gorgeous day, sunny with blue sky and very attenuated white clouds at the horizon, and a lovely +19 (66). I worked on Wednesday’s post to the point where I arrived at the pond at the base of Grey Mountain.

I took the Dunmore, Mabou, and Rear Intervale Roads, all in fine shape, to the Celtic Music Interpretive Centre where the cèilidh today featured John Pellerin on fiddle; Marion Dewar on keyboard; and Kenny Stewart, whom I’d not heard play before, on guitar (I later learned that he, John, and Allan Dewar were members of a traditional band in their early days). All three hail from the Antigonish area, so I don’t get very many chances to hear them and seize every opportunity I get.

¹ Posted on Friday, 30 June, for Sunday, 25 June. Several photos have been included that were not posted to Facebook.↩

I had fish cakes and beans with the house salad just as the cèilidh got underway. They began playing a quarter hour early and played past 17h. More traditional players than these would be hard to find nowadays. John has a lot of tunes I don’t get to hear so often and Marion’s accompaniments complement John’s fiddle superbly well, so I was in heaven all afternoon long; Kenny’s guitar was likewise a fine addition to the overall sound. Their slow airs were especially superb, with a rich and gorgeous texture and fullness; one, with a lovely short keyboard introduction by Marion, sounded to my ears like a Gaelic hymn. There were tunes I didn’t recognize at all, as during a lovely waltz set beginning with one I hadn’t heard before and one I had. The first set of jigs brought five couples to the floor for a square set and a second with four couples was danced soon after. Shortly after 15h Stephanie MacDonald relieved John on fiddle and gave us a fine set beginning with a slow march. The rest of the afternoon, Collie Rankin joined John to make dual fiddles. Two more square sets were danced. one with twelve couples and one with eight. Waltzes brought couples to the floor as well as the square sets. Stephanie, Siobhan Beaton, John (as noted a step dancer as he is a fiddler), KC Beaton, and Dale Gillis step danced during the step dance segment. By the end of the afternoon, the audience had considerably thinned out, so there were no takers for the last set of waltzes nor the last set of jigs. But I was delighted to hear the strathspeys and reels and especially the slow airs, one of which ended the cèilidh. What a lovely afternoon of superb and magical music!

The visitor from Nebraska I met on Friday at the Shoe was in attendance with his family; most of them were invited to dance in the square sets and they had a wonderful afternoon. I chatted with them during the cèilidh and, since it was their last day in Cape Breton, suggested they take a tour of Colindale Road and Hunters Road on their way back to Inverness to leave them with some amazing views to remember.

After thanking the musicians, I headed off over the backcountry roads to the Shoe, where a cèilidh with Howie MacDonald on fiddle and Mac Morin on piano had been in progress since 16h. This is one of the many times I have wished I could be in multiple places at once! Fortunately, the schedules of the two cèilidhs don’t entirely overlap, so I got to catch most of the last half of the Red Shoe cèilidh. Friends invited me to sit with them and I was glad to accept their offer. Howie was absolutely on fire, giving us some of the finest playing I have ever heard from him, and Mac, as always, was superb, supplying dazzling accompaniments matching Howie’s playing perfectly. Kenneth MacKenzie replaced Howie on fiddle for a couple of sets, giving him a well-deserved break. Cheryl MacQuarrie and Iain MacQuarrie step danced near the end of the cèilidh.

Once the cèilidh had ended, I had planned on returning to the motel and catching up on my writing, but Mac told me he was playing at the Distillery with Ian MacDougall and Pius MacIsaac. I drove to Celtic Shores Coastal Trail crossing of Highway 19 in Mabou in the shade and continued working on Wednesday’s account there until it was time to head for the Distillery.

I sat with Ian’s wife, Bhreagh, whom I had met before but never had a chance to visit with at length. A very charming lady, she is working on becoming a doctor, which will likely require a residency off the Island, so we may once again lose Ian for a time. But she hopes to return to Cape Breton when she has finished, so it won’t be a permanent loss.

What a treat to hear Mac and Ian together again! The tunes, some of which only he plays regularly, came rushing forth and Mac, from long experience with Ian, provided the other half of that marvellous sound I so love, enriched by Pius’ guitar. Gerry Deveau was in attendance, so we got a marathon session on spoons; it is amazing to watch if you’ve never seen it before and many photos and videos were taken as they played. Pius gave us a fine set on mandolin, accompanied by Mac. A second spoons set occurred before the cèilidh ended. I left after talking with Stuart Cameron, who had recently been working as a cook on a ship on the St Lawrence Seaway and Great Lakes as part of his schooling and had passed through the Thousand Islands where I grew up.

I drove back to the motel, super content at having taken in another star-studded triple header, and continued working on Wednesday’s account, but didn’t finish it before I retired at 0h30.