Fiddling with success Versatile violinist goes with the bow, from Bach to the Beatles and beyond By: David Sanderson Posted: 2:00 AM CDT Saturday, Jun. 27, 2026

Can you hear the drums Fernando? How about the violin?

It’s Friday night at the Stadium Kitchen + Bar, 2935 Pembina Hwy. After delivering spot-on renditions of Neil Diamond’s Sweet Caroline and the Righteous Brothers’ Unchained Melody, solo violinist Allan Palmer polls a small yet enthusiastic audience, asking what they would like to hear next. A couple celebrating a birthday calls out for “some ABBA,” causing Palmer to launch into a medley of Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight) and Fernando, two of the Swedish pop group’s biggest hits.

Moving freely around the room, the 26-year-old, stylishly attired in a black buttoned shirt, dark trousers and polished leather shoes, follows that up with a hip-swaying version of Madonna’s La Isla Bonita before segueing into La Vie en Rose, a plaintive melody popularized 90 years ago by French singer Edith Piaf.

Later, during a short break, Palmer reports that his vast repertoire covers everything from Bach to the Beatles, a major reason why he gets booked regularly for gatherings such as weddings and charity events, not to mention the odd lounge date.

“The thing is, because I’m a violinist, audiences aren’t always sure how to react… whether they’re supposed to sit and listen politely,” says Palmer, who, thanks to a high-fidelity, wireless speaker attached to his belt, plays along to karaoke-style backing tracks.

“Except when I do something super upbeat like Livin’ La Vida Loca or Smooth Criminal, they usually get the idea and start clapping, singing and throwing out requests.”

Palmer was seven years old when his parents took him to the Centennial Concert Hall to see the stage production of Phantom of the Opera, the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical that premièred in London’s West End in 1986. He had already watched the film version, but after witnessing string-heavy showstoppers All I Ask of You and The Music of the Night in-person, he begged his parents to sign him up for violin lessons.

He was a quick study. Though for his first public recital, he eschewed selections from Phantom in favour of a tune associated with a different masked icon — the title theme from the animated Spider-Man TV series (“Spider-Man, Spider-Man, does whatever a spider can”) that ran from 1967 to 1970.

By the age of 10 Palmer was confident enough in his abilities to successfully apply to be a summer busker at The Forks. Once or twice a week, his mother would take their dog for a walk by the river while he entertained onlookers near the Johnston Terminal. He did that for three years in a row and remembers how excited he used to get whenever somebody leaned down to toss a loonie or toonie in his violin case, he says, adding that it certainly beat running a lemonade stand for extra cash.

Palmer was a Grade 10 student at Glenlawn Collegiate when he decided to start teaching out of his family home. He dropped off flyers advertising his services throughout his Royalwood neighbourhood and managed to secure close to a dozen students, some of whom were four times his age.

His instructing schedule didn’t get in the way of his own lessons, which led to his 2019 acceptance to the University of Manitoba’s faculty of music. His original plan was to follow the education route, with a goal of teaching music in a public-school setting. His mindset began to shift during his first year, however, when he started offering his services as a solo violinist for wedding processions and celebrations of life. Quite often, guests would approach him to ask if he was available for other occasions, like birthday dinners or office get-togethers. Hmm, he told himself; perhaps that was an avenue worth pursuing.

Palmer continued to work steadily around his university schedule until March 2020 and the arrival of COVID-19. His bookings may have dried up that year and well into the next, but he used his time wisely by experimenting with new and different ways of presenting his music. He came up with the idea of playing along to karaoke tracks of popular songs he already knew, which he’d call up on his phone — not just slower-tempo stuff, which had previously been his bread and butter, but also faster numbers like A Ha’s Take On Me.

“By the end of 2021, when everything finally opened up again, I’d developed a fairly large repertoire,” he says. “And because the karaoke tracks created a much fuller sound, it made what I’d been doing a lot more noticeable. Pretty soon, people were videoing me and inquiring about getting me to play at this, that and the other thing.”

Some of his more memorable gigs have included a sold-out New Year’s Eve rave at the same venue he saw Phantom of the Opera at as a grade schooler, multiple Variety Club fundraisers at the RBC Convention Centre and last year’s St. Boniface Hospital Foundation’s Rosé Soirée, which carried a rock-and-roll theme and required him to brush up on the catalogues of Queen, Journey and Aerosmith. (Trust us, you haven’t really heard Dream On till you’ve heard it played on the violin.)

As well, Palmer brings his violin — a Ming Jiang Zhu model that was handcrafted in Guangzhou, China — with him whenever he travels. This has led to opportunities to ply his trade in Paris cafés, Mexican resorts and in 2023, one of the most famous watering holes in Europe.

“I was busking in the street outside the Temple Bar Pub in Dublin and was drawing quite the crowd when the police showed up and told me I couldn’t play without a licence,” he says. “People starting booing and the owner of the pub came outside to see what was going on. He invited me inside to do a set and practically the whole crowd came in, too. It was absolutely wild.”

Carly Lomonaco-Norris is part-owner of the Original Sorrento’s, located inside the Caboto Centre on Wilkes Avenue. Her restaurant caters many of the affairs held at the centre, and three years ago, she saw Palmer perform there for the first time, at a charity function.

“I was watching him from the back of the hall, thinking this guy is absolutely amazing. I approached him when he was done to ask if he had any cards, mostly because I couldn’t wait to tell everybody I knew about him,” Lomonaco-Norris says.

Lomonaco-Norris has since tasked Palmer with providing entertainment for the Caboto Centre’s annual New Year’s Eve galas and at brunches for Easter and Mother’s Day. Additionally, he played at her wedding in 2024, serenading her and her husband with a Harry Styles number moments after they traded vows.

“Not only is he versatile — I can’t even guess how many songs he knows — but he’s a true performer, too,” she continues. “Even though the whole room can hear him when he plays, he literally goes from table to table all evening long, engaging everybody individually and totally making their night.”

She laughs, saying he’s been adopted by Winnipeg’s Italian community as “one of our own,” for the number of Italian songs — O Sole Mio, That’s Amore, Volare — he’s taught himself now that he appears regularly at the Caboto Centre.

“He learned an entire catalogue of Italian music just for our food-and-wine tasting events, which was so appreciated. I jokingly call him ‘my’ violinist because I use him every chance I get.”

Palmer, whose YouTube channel has racked up tens of thousands of views since its inception a few years ago, is currently working with a manager in Toronto in an effort to land work outside of Winnipeg. (Good luck finding room in his schedule; he was hired for 71 local weddings in 2025 and is already slated for 65 this year, with six months remaining on the calendar.)

“I still dream about having a stand-alone studio of my own one day, for teaching purposes,” says Palmer, who continues to take weekly classes with a U of M instructor. “But I did read about a violinist in Los Angeles who charges something crazy like six grand for two hours, so who knows where this might lead.

“I don’t know if you’ve heard of 2Cellos, which plays pop, rock and classical songs in arenas all over the world, but that would be the ultimate dream: to play at Canada Life (Centre), with a full band onstage behind me.”

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