The Lethbridge Folk Club had a pretty good crowd , March 2 for an enjoyable evening of music from Nova Scotian storyteller Dave Gunning.
He began his second set by talking a lot about Maritime musician/ television personality and “godfather of Canadian Celtic music” John Allen Cameron. He outlined Cameron’s background, noting he studied to be a priest originally before turning his attention to music, in the process influencing everyone from the Rankin Family to Ashley MacIsaac and Gunning himself. Gunning observed Cameron joked to his fellow priests before leaving “I’ll be a father before you guys.”
Gunning then played a couple of instrumental Cameron’s bagpipe pieces impressively on a 12 string guitar which lead to enthusiastic applause from the audience. He went right into one of his songs. He had a pleasant voice reminiscent of Murray McLauchlan.
He played a song, “These Hands” which he wrote with country star George Canyon and got the crowd to sing along with him.
He looked about ready to play all night, but started winding things down round 10:30 p.m. by playing the Hockey Song, which he wrote with David Francey.
