Summer Concert Series

This summer I was able to attend a number of concerts.

My summer concert series started with a free concert in Art Park (Lewiston, New York). It was Peter Frampton on his Frampton Comes Alive anniversary tour. He played his iconic album exactly the way he did all those years ago. Many times I felt transported back to the wood paneled basements of many of my friends during the summer of ’75 when Frampton Comes Alive was the only album we ever played. The audience was pulled back to the present however when Peter explained that during instrumental sections during the original tour the band would run off the stage and do some drugs behind the scenes before they ran back on for encore numbers. Peter then added the only drug he does now is Viagra!

A few weeks later we enjoyed a special concert at Jackson-Triggs winery in Niagara-on-the-Lake. We indulged in a dinner at the winery where each course of the gourmet meal was paired with a different wine. As there were five courses and then of course the before dinner wines and the wines during the concert, there was a lot of wine drinking at the winery that night! Between glasses we also got to enjoy the solo performance of Gord Downey from the Tragically Hip. (For the record, my friend Diane was designated driver for the night…….just saying)

There was also a Northern Pikes concert at Polson Pier formerly known as “the Docks” in Toronto. It is a fabulous location where it feels you are at a resort in Muskoka when you are actually on the shores of Lake Ontario beneath the shadow of the CN Tower. It was at the Northern Pikes concert I met “Eddie” from Love It or List It.

While it would not come under the classification of a concert, the most fun and outrageous musical events of the summer was the Friday evening performances of the One Man Electrical Band at Hogan’s Alley in Port Dalhousie. The location is superb as it is a few blocks from our home. There is no cover as the talent of this one man band is questionable, but his choice of songs is impeccable. He always seems to know the right song to sing for the crowd. Within a few minutes it turns into bad karaoke, embarrassing dancing and a lot of fun for a bunch of middle-aged Friday night drinkers. I believe we are good entertainment for the 20-something kids heading out for a night out to their bar of choice “My Cottage.”

In some ways my summer concert series was a rediscovering my youth but in more ways it was confirmation my youth is long gone! My youth may be gone but middle age is actually even better! No curfew!