Wendell Ferguson is an off the wall cut up, who is  counterbalanced by the more down to earth demeanour of Katherine Wheatley, who played to a good sized crowd of about 50 at  the Lethbridge Folk Club, Wolf’s Den, Nov. 10.
 I arrived in the midst of a chilly night just as Ferguson was playing “Throw Another Fiddle on the Fire,” one of a few of his “stupid song,” which he followed up with  his motorboat song “Great Big Johnson.”  He cracked  lot of jokes at the expense of MC Wayne Hales, while Wheatley thanked Hales for lending her his guitar.
Ferguson was in an instrumental mood though, preferring to let his guitar do the singing with his jaw dropping finger-picking.

On the other  hand, Katherine  Wheatley was the more serious of the duo,  while playing rhythm to Ferguson's  hot playing, she also sang beautiful melodies and admonished  Ferguson for some of his dirtier jokes.

 She talked of growing up in Parry Sound, “the home of the second longest trestle bridge,” and talked about her friends trying to get her first kiss before she turned 16, attracting the attention of a musician who called she called a “creep” who ended up being from Lethbridge, then singing a beautiful song “I’m Sweet 16.”

She also sang some other songs chock full of vivid imagery including “Tarpaper Shack,” about a man who may have been a  train robber who moved to Parry Sound.

Ferguson turned momentarily serious as he talked about being influenced by Chet Atkins, then knocked off a impressive fingerpicked version of Mr. Sandman, after which he played his own instrumental “Fret No More,” featuring a cascade of beautiful harmonics, then literally howled at the wolf howling at the moon tapestry at the back of the stage.

 Wheatley took over by asking the audience what the first song in the world was, which was written by  Paul Anka, then got the crowd singing with her song “Hallelujah.”

She wound down the show with the catchy “Main Street.” Wendell incorporated licks from most of the Beatles’ catalogue into his guitar solo for that song.

They were called back for a couple of encores. The audience wanted to hear an obscure song from Wendell Ferguson, which he wasn't sure he would be able to remembe, and the most popular of his ‘stupid’ songs “P.I.G.” which was modelled after Tammy Wynette’s country hit “D.I.V.O.R.C.E”
 That inspired Wheatley to perform a stunningly beautiful version of Henry Mancini’s “Moon River.” to close the show which lasted a lot later than most folk club shows, going until around 11:30 p.m,