What’s up: The Ex, Ariel Gordon, Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra, Boy Golden, Rainbow Harmony Project

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This article was published 13/06/2024 (501 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Two weeks of midway fun

Red River Ex

• June 14 to 23
• Red River Exhibition Park, 3977 Portage Ave.
• Advance tickets and ride passes at redriverex.com

The Red River Ex returns to Winnipeg this weekend, signalling the unofficial start of summer.

The annual 10-day festival features dozens of colourful midway rides, live music, family entertainment, shopping and juried competitions.

Free (with admission) concerts featuring local musicians and cover bands take place daily across the park’s three stages. The schedule also includes performances by magicians, circus dogs, baton twirlers, martial arts groups, dance troupes and cheer squads. Keep an eye out for roving puppeteers, clowns, superheroes, pipe bands and dinosaurs.

Exhibition Place will host a range of retail vendors, as well as displays for this year’s judged quilt, art and photo shows. The site’s Big Red Barn has been rebranded as the spooky “Barn of Doom.”

Head over to the Loop — a new area on the west side of the park — for harness racing, motocross, more dinosaurs, an inflatable corn maze, a petting zoo and agricultural exhibits. Also new this year is the nearby Indigenous Village, featuring educational and musical performances. On June 21, the Ex is hosting a pow wow and cultural celebration in honour of National Indigenous Peoples Day.

Admission tickets and ride passes can be purchased in advance or at the gate. Children six years and younger get in free.

— Eva Wasney

Fungal: Foraging in the Urban Forest book launch

• Ariel Gordon in conversation with Kerry Ryan
• Tonight, 7 p.m.
• McNally Robinson Booksellers, Grant Park (1120 Grant Ave.)
• Free

In her new collection of poetic essays, Winnipeg writer (and Free Press copy editor) Ariel Gordon takes a deep dive into the marvellous and sometimes mysterious world of mushrooms.

Fungal: Foraging in the Urban Forests is Gordon’s sixth book, published June 11 by Wolsak & Wynn; it’s a followup of sorts to her 2019 book, Treed: Walking in Canada’s Urban Forests.

(Gordon has published other work in between, including her 2023 collaborative poetry collection Siteseeing, co-authored by Saskatchewan’s Brenda Schmidt.)

Fungal sees Gordon ruminate on the natural world and the interconnectedness of all things as she observes her surroundings and wanders through a range of landscapes — riverbeds, sidewalks, urban forests and more — in search of all manner of mushrooms.

Gordon will launch Fungal at tonight at McNally Robinson, where she’ll be joined in conversation by Winnipeg poet Kerry Ryan. The event will also be streamed on the bookstore’s YouTube channel.

— Ben Sigurdson

WJO’s summer series kicks off

Winnipeg Jazz Orchesta

• Sunday, 7 p.m.
• Le Patio 340 @ Centre culturel franco-manitobain
• Tickets $20 at 204-632-5299, winnipegjazzorchestra.com

Enjoy some music al fresco at the Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra’s monthly Summer Series, which kicks off Sunday night with a concert featuring Winnipeg jazz-pop chanteuse Flora Luna.

Flora Luna is the stage name of Geneviève Freynet, who performs in French and English and on piano and guitar. She’ll be performing songs from her debut EP, L’autre bord du mur, which came out March, while saxophonist Niall Cade will lead the orchestra through jazz standards. (You can also catch Flora Luna at Old Market Square on June 19 as part of the Winnipeg International Jazz Festival.)

On Monday, the Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra Honour Jazz Band will take the stage at the West End Cultural Centre as part of jazz fest. Formed in 1990, the WJO’s annual Honour Jazz Bands program provides high school students from across the province the opportunity to learn from the best in the biz and perform at the festival. That show is at 7:30 p.m. and tickets are $20.

— Jen Zoratti

Begonia, Boy Golden and Fontine take Brandon

• Keystone Centre
• Saturday, 6 p.m.
• Free

Three of the province’s most charismatic indie performers are treating Brandonites to a free outdoor concert Saturday to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Keystone Centre.

The original centre opened in 1972 and has since expanded to occupy more than half-a-million square feet of programming space in Brandon’s commercial district, becoming one of the city’s most important economic drivers.

For Boy Golden, the sprawling alt-country act of Liam Duncan, the concert marks a homecoming. Over the past three years, since the release of his debut album Church of Better Daze, Boy Golden has achieved terrific success, playing a scene-stealing, pinch-hitter set on the mainstage at the 2023 Winnipeg Folk Festival and selling out the Burton Cummings Theatre in November. The Keystone set will likely offer attendees an advance opportunity to listen to selections from Duncan’s highly anticipated full-length album, For Eden, due out July 19.

On stage with Duncan for that star-making set was the indomitable Fontine, a longtime member of the Church of Better Daze band and an exuberant performer-songwriter in her own right. On the strength of her debut EP Yarrow Lover, released in 2023, the Brandon-raised Fontine has also had an ascendent year, playing alongside William Prince and opening for the Australian indie group the Paper Kites while also touring extensively with Boy Golden. Fontine is also set to appear at Dauphin’s Countryfest on June 29.

At this point, Begonia shouldn’t require an introduction, but just in case: the Juno-winning pop project has been the home since 2016 for Alexa Dirks, formerly of Chic Gamine. After her critically acclaimed album Powder Blue reached the Polaris Prize short list last year, Begonia is readying for the July 17 release of a followup EP, Open Swim. The earliest glimpse is the lead single Stay Forever, co-written with producer Marcus Paquin (the National, Sarah Harmer.) “It’s basically about being afraid to trust someone else (and maybe even yourself) in order to fall fully into a healthy love,” she says.

— Ben Waldman

Get Connected

Connect: Celebrating 25 Years of Rainbow Harmony Project

• Saturday, 7 p.m.
• Manitoba Theatre for Young People
• Tickets $25 at rainbowharmonyproject.ca

Rainbow Harmony Project is Winnipeg’s choral community of LGBTTQ+ people and allies, dedicated to celebrating diverse identities through the power of song since 1999. Over the last two decades, it has provided a space for people to meet and explore singing for social change.

This weekend, Winnipeggers can celebrate community, connection and 25 years of singing out with Connect.

The milestone concert explores relationships and community building, which are core values of the RHP. The event uses songs to promote love, acceptance and unity and to celebrate diverse identities and experiences. It will feature performances by the RHP, alumni and the RHP Youth Choir, led by artistic director Brittany Mielnichuk.

Tickets are $25 at rainbowharmonyproject.ca; children and students (Grade 12 and under) are $10.

— Thandi Vera

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