Video slideshow: JFK Portrayals

Stellar year for Manitoba artists at WCMAs

Manitoba acts earned top honours at this past weekend’s Western Canadian Music Awards in Victoria, including pop artist of the year for Begonia, a francophone artist of the year award for Jocelyn Baribeau, video director of the year for Taylor Brown and two awards for the Brandon-raised Fontine, who took home prizes for rock artist and Indigenous artist of the year.

It was double time for the Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra, which for the second consecutive year was named Western Canada’s jazz artist of the year.

The recognition comes on the strength of the WJO’s most recent recording, Forgotten Stories Suite, a project by local woodwind specialist Sean Irvine that blends spoken word, instrumental soundscapes and sung vocals to amplify stories of queer experience.

“As I started becoming a composer, I was thinking about what I had to say,” says Irvine, a musician with a doctorate of jazz performance from the University of Toronto and a master’s in performance and literature from Brandon University.

Video slideshow: JFK Portrayals

A wide range of actors have played President John F. Kennedy in the movies and on TV, starting even before his assassination 50 years ago. Our video slideshow reviews some memorable portrayals.

Former host/VJ Rick Campanelli revisits his gambling addiction in new memoir

To many Canadians, veteran media personality Rick Campanelli is better known as Rick the Temp, the energetic, baby-faced intern-turned-VJ on MuchMusic in the 1990s and early 2000s.

But behind that winning smile was a much darker reality.

In his new memoir, Tempted: My Story, released last month via HarperCollins Canada and co-written with John Meyer, Campanelli, 56, opens up for the first time about his struggles with a serious — and secret — gambling addiction, which reached its nadir in 2008 when the then-host of Entertainment Tonight Canada was detained by U.S. Homeland Security for unpaid casino debts on a flight back from Las Vegas.

The Free Press caught up with Campanelli in advance of his Winnipeg launch Monday evening at McNally Robinson Grant Park. This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

Amazon in the weeds over damage to tall grass reserve

Patricia Dutchak was devastated when she first saw the wide swaths of crushed grass and upturned soil at Winnipeg’s Rotary Prairie Nature Park, a municipal heritage site.

“This is a very rare ecosystem, a remnant of tall grass prairie, there’s barely any left in the world, and to come here and see all this damage was heartbreaking,” Dutchak, chair of the Transcona Rotary Club’s parks committee, says.

The club is responsible for maintaining the protected green space, which was significantly damaged this summer when a fence between the park and the neighbouring Amazon distribution centre was relocated.

The 20-acre nature preserve is situated on a narrow tract of land on Regent Avenue West in the commercial heart of Transcona. The park received its municipal heritage designation in 1992 and is, today, surrounded by high-traffic streets, industrial warehouses and car dealerships.

MPI lowers speed limit on tech upgrade with ‘IT roadmap’ following Project Nova debacle

Manitoba Public Insurance is now using an “IT road map” and phasing in new technology and systems after pulling the plug last year on its failed $164-million overhaul known as Project Nova, its annual report says.

Sky is the limit for Lavoie

Anisha Kinnarath Salam is gearing up for an important week.

AK Soccer Academy, the Winnipeg-based club Kinnarath Salam and her father started in 2019, is in Surrey, B.C., this week for the Canada Soccer National Championships — a first for the 15U girls team — and Kinnarath Salam believes her side has a legitimate shot at winning it all.

“We’ve had the squad, but this is a very talented group,” said Kinnarath Salam. “A few of these girls have been with us since they were five years old. A few have been with us since they were like 10. But we got some powerhouses last year.”

One of those new headlining talents is winger Quinn Lavoie, a product of West St. Paul who has brought a tantalizing blend of speed, technical skill and high IQ on the pitch.