This evening (September 25th), Winkler will be the location for a musical affair that highlights talent from outside the province and even outside the country. Tonight’s one-night show features The Daae Family, based in Saskatchewan, and their friends from Nashville, The Midsouth Band.
Country Roots
The Midsouth Band has been a part of the Christian country music community off and on since before the aughts, but tonight’s show is part of a tour whose scale is a first in decades for the group.
“In the late 90s, we decided we weren't going to do it full-time anymore. We were having kids, and we kind of wanted to spend more time home with the family, but we decided that we were going to get together from time to time and perform,” says Robby McGee, a member of the group who plays the keyboard, does vocals, and writes songs. “A little over a year ago, [we said], ‘Hey, our kids are all gone, so why don't we jump out there and start doing some more dates?’ We started . . . writing some songs and put together a new project that'll be coming out in October, so we're excited about it.”
The group has had the same line-up of musicians since 1985. As for the Daae Family (also in the Christian music scene), although the composition of their group has undergone some changes, the tour marks a return to music for them as well.
“The core of our family, like our siblings here, is still going, and we're happy to do that, but [we were in the] same sort of situation that these guys were in back in the 90s . . . . [Now], our families are all getting older and growing up [too],” says Dan Daae. “Time marches on, but . . . we're just trying to do whatever we can do to get out still, and we're happy to be back here in Winkler.”
One of the styles the Daae Family is known for is their gospel music, but that’s not all.
“We don't really limit it to any specific style, [it’s] just whatever song is on our hearts to share with people,” he says. “We just want to uplift people wherever we go, and that's kind of our mission, and it's been that way for years.”
From spectator to tour partner
Daae says that his family formed its musical group back in 1989 when he was five. At approximately ten years old, he had the inspiring opportunity to see the Midsouth Band perform.
“We're from the Estevan area, and we watched them in a concert back in the mid-90s, and so it's kind of a neat thing for us to go out on the road with them,” he says. “[After that], we kind of met these guys off and on down the road [at] different music festivals and stuff like that . . . . Then all of a sudden, Kent gives me a call out of the blue last spring and says, ‘We'd like to come back to Canada to do a tour, and we're just curious if you guys would want to join us.”
And so, the tour was born.
“Our groups have a lot of things in common,” says Daae. “We just thought, ‘Why not give it a whirl and reach out and see if there's interest in having us come?’ I think there's a hunger for this kind of music out there. We're just hoping we can see as many people as we can, and like I said, encourage people wherever we go.”
The details
The concert takes place tonight at the P.W. Enns Centennial Concert Hall in Winkler. The show begins at 7 p.m. and doors open at 6:30 p.m. Tickets can be purchased here.
For Mcgee, performing in Canada is a pleasure.
“We've come to Canada quite a bit and we didn't really know what to expect the first time we came up here [in terms of] how [Canadians] would receive the music,” says McGee. “They really embraced the country sound that we have. It's sort of a progressive, maybe a pop country sound, and they really embraced it — so we love coming to Canada and singing.”
Be sure to stay informed about the other upcoming musical events at P.W. Enns Centennial Concert Hall.
~With files from Jayme Giesbrecht~