The first Windy City Opry was a success on a chilly Wednesday night, Dec. 14 at the Slice.
Shaela Miller’s new regular roots music night drew a decent sized mid week crowd to hear a whole lot of hot banjo picking and a lot more grinning.
While I missed opening sets from Amy Nelson and Rugged Little Thing, I caught an exceptional set of roots and barn burning bluegrass picking from Saskatoon’s Eliza Doyle and bandmates guitarist Paula McGuigan, drummer/ steel guitarist Luke Goetz and upright bassist Liza Holder.
Doyle definitely has a way with a banjo. They played several barn burning songs from her new solo CD including highlights “Chicken Song,” “Underground,”“ San Francisco Bound and the hot “Molly Brown,” for which she alternately apologized to any Molly Browns in the audience and noting she’d like to meet the Molly Brown in the song.
The band sang stunning multi-part harmonies which brought me back to the days of one of her previous bands, the Cracker Cats.
“Nothin’ to Lose” was another highlight of the set. She dusted off the dobro for a Hank Williams cover and several other songs including some of the slower numbers, which she introduced by saying the band gets upset when she skips the slower songs, before switching back to the banjo for more barn burners.
“Molly Brown” was one of the highlights of the more upbeat numbers.
She wound down her set by bringing Shaela Miller, Amy Nelson and Jille Shotton from Rugged Little Thing to sing background vocals on “ Honky Tonk Blues.” 
