150th Canada Day Fireworks Festival in Timmins
TIMMINS - As promised, the City of Timmins has lined up some big name entertainment that will be performing next summer at the International Fireworks Competition and Music Festival.
The long-awaited announcement as to which performers have been hired for the eight-day event was made at noon Thursday during a news conference held at the Timmins Museum.
Keith Urban is the big name that has been booked for the Canada Day 150 celebration, which is designed as a celebratory finale to the eight-day festival that begins on June 24, 2017 and runs through to July 1, 2017; each night featuring a spectacle of fireworks and music at the Hollinger Park’s Fred Salvador Field.
With Urban as the main Canada Day performer being a New Zealander, there is still plenty of Canadian content in the Saturday night line-up including Juno Award winning Johnny Reid, Canadian Country Music Award nominee Meghan Patrick and the Sons of Maxwell, the popular East Coast Music Award winners Don and Dave Carroll, who grew up in Timmins and now live in Nova Scotia.
The eight days of music and fireworks is to kick off on Saturday, June 24, which is St. Jean Baptiste day and a traditional day of celebration of music and culture for the Francophone community.
In tribute to that, the June 24 performers include Michel Pagliaro, a well-known and popular Juno Award winning rocker from Montreal, who is a member of the Canadian songwriters hall of fame. Also performing on the opening night will be LGS and Timmins-born pop rocker Cindy Doire.
The Sunday show includes a stellar line-up of vintage rockers that includes David Wilcox, Sass Jordan, along with the more folksy and pop presentations from Scarlett Jane and Timmins performer Céleste Lévis.
The Monday night performance will appeal to the 1980s-era rockers in the community as Tom Cochrane with Red Rider will take to the stage.
The younger crowd are expected to enjoy the Tuesday night performers, which includes Lights and Simple Plan. The Wednesday show also has a more contemporary appeal as Hedley and Alyssa Reid are booked for that night.
Then on the Thursday, the older rock crowd might enjoy seeing April Wine, Alan Frew and The Box.
Friday night, stage goes country with The Washboard Union and Cold Creek Country. It appears there will be other performers, not yet revealed, who will be invited to perform as well. This is expected to include local performers.
The eight day event has what might be considered a catchy name, Stars and Thunder 2017, which is also the name for the ticket-buying website: http://www.starsandthunder.com/
A scan of the website at noon today indicated that tickets for residents of Timmins will go on sale in six days time, while tickets for the non-residents of Timmins go on sale a day later.
Following is the complete list of performers booked for the festival:
Saturday June 24, 2017
Michel Pagliaro
LGS
Cindy Doire
Sunday June 25, 2017
David Wilcox
Sass Jordan
Scarlett Jane
Céleste Lévis
Monday June 26, 2017
Tom Cochrane with Red Rider
Tuesday June 27, 2017
Simple Plan
Lights
Wednesday June 28, 2017
Hedley
Alyssa Reid
Thursday June 29, 2017
April Wine
Alan Frew
The Box
Friday June 30, 2017
Cold Creek Country
The Washboard Union
Saturday July 1, 2017
Keith Urban
Johnny Reid
Meghan Patrick
Sons of Maxwell