By Dessa Bayrock (The Cascade) – Email
Well, dear readers, the madness has started.
By madness, I mean the five jam-packed days I have at the Juno Awards this year.
Today began at 4:30 a.m. when I left the house to catch my flight to Regina, where the awards show is located this year. I’ve never been to Saskatchewan before, but there’s a first time for everything. My initial impressions? Very flat. Very cloudy. The people seem nice.
As we left Edmonton on the final leg of the journey, the clouds beneath us looked like someone had ripped apart giant sofa cushions, leaving cotton stuffing everywhere. These clouds—the very cliché of what puffball clouds should look like—soon merged into a sea of white, as though a layer of snow had fallen over the land.
I was disappointed to see a generous amount of snow on the ground when we finally descended through the cloud layer, but not really surprised.
Roads and rivers stretched out like the lines of an Etch-A-Sketch in every direction. I was concerned at the lack of buildings.
“But where’s Regina?” I felt like begging the person next to me. “I don’t see any city!”
I was expecting something more akin to Vancouver than Chilliwack, but Regina is definitely on the smaller side on the scale of cities. That being said, it’s packed to the gills with Juno mania. Signage is on any surface that can hold a sign – banners strung up in the airport, posters and leaflets gathering in corners like fallen leaves. My own frantic search to find last minute accommodations informed me that nearly every hotel, motel and hostel is booked until next Wednesday at the earliest.
This is a town ready to pop with excitement.
I arrived too late to pick up my press badge today, but I managed to snag one of the last tickets to the nearly-sold-out taping of Jian Ghomeshi’s Q this evening. An audience of 1500 watched and cheered as the charismatic CBC host interviewed k.d. lang, Tom Cochrane and Bahamas. We listened, rapt, to performances by all three.
Near the end of the two-hour live show, a woman made her way up to the very edge of the stage and stood there, with her arms outstretched to Jian.
“Oh,” he said, as though it was perfectly natural, and knelt to give her a hug.
As a producer escorted her away from the stage, Jian turned back to the audience.
“That’s the spirit of Saskatchewan, right there,” he said, grinning. The crowd erupted into applause and laughter.
I’m not the only one excited to be here, and one thing is clear – this is not only an awards show, but a celebration of what it means to be Canadian.
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Feel free to take a look at the artists performing in Regina over the next few days, and if there’s anyone you want me to track down, I’ll give it a shot.
As always, you can follow me in real time at @YoDessa. I cannot guarantee I will be completely on-topic 100 per cent of the time.
