Well, the Tour is out and active. Covid cancels started after I'd already driven the first 1000km across the Great Lakes, past the rocks and trees and rocks and trees and water and rocks and trees: the Northern Shield, up over Superior until it's too late to turn around, too late to give it up. It was too late a lifetime ago, when I started this journey. Now it's big spaces between small places, and there is plenty of time to revisit memories.
About a quarter of the western Canadian shows have been Covid cancelled. Each province and territory is a bit different: some have done really well moving ahead– others not. Rules change frequently as to gatherings, shows, proof of vaccination. Some venues have not felt able to move forward with even restricted shows. While I understand and respect their decisions, Covid has left the Canadian tour in a money losing position from the time it reached the middle of Canada. Go home and lose a lot of money, or continue and possibly only lose a little. That said, the played shows have been really great. Every show is capacity! Crowds have been supportive, and the Music is coming back strong. Venues have all paid me above what I expected, a fact for which I am very thankful, and will not forget. Presenters are the unsung heroes out here on the Blues Highway.
The Big Lincoln fell sick in Kamloops, British Columbia, requiring me to continue to the Pacific coast in a rental. A ten hour return to pick it up is on deck! Repairs to the car, plus the rentals underline the voodoo economics of some music tours: all the money that is made is returned to the local economy– one way or another! The shows are going well, and I'm trying to look at this western Canadian tour as an investment in myself. Like so many other musicians, I was locked down for many months. These front end gigs have helped me back on to the stages I love so much, and have provided the confidence one can only gain by performing. So all is good. And I'm looking forward to some shows in eastern Ontario before I arrive in South Africa in January. Am I ready? Oh, yeah!!
Blogspot, which hosts this website has changed its editing and formatting software. As a result, after a decade of setting up tour blogs on this platform, this may be the last one. Too late for me to change it up now– but it is very difficult to edit and update my Tour schedule here. They've taken away plain language editing. I can do enough HTML to get by in a pinch, but there are no line numbers, and I simply can't take the huge whacks of time needed to make simple updates. I could previously do these update in seconds. I'm unhappy! But I will try my best to keep that part of the page as up to date as possible. If you are a promoter/venue you can email or social message me should you require clarifications on the date side of things. The rest is good. Changes to the Africa schedule are coming: the Tour will just be South Africa and Botswana. Covid regulations and multiple border crossings are providing a planning nightmare that can't be sorted from the virtual office as the Tour rolls out playing shows. More SA dates to be added in place of the missing border states. Fingers crossed!!
Vancouver dates were fabulous. The Tour now moves to Vancouver Island for a string of shows.
