August 3, 2007

This man's still playin'
Lennie Gallant, with opening act Chiquésa, delights a packed house at St. Augustine Church

TODD MACLEAN
The Guardian

Lennie Gallant, playing his traditional mid-summer show for the hometown crowd at St. Augustine Church in South Rustico — it’s an adored local event that has been going on so long now, many Rustico teenagers can’t remember it ever not being a part of the summer.

Sold out days in advance,...featuring Gallant with opening act Chiquésa, was as great a success as ever this past Sunday evening as a crowd of several hundred filed into pews, piling in right to the rafters.

Before the hometown hero took the stage, the evening of music began with a contemporary Acadian ensemble that has been making a lot of waves on the regional music scene over the past couple of years: Chiquésa.

The sun had just set in a pink and orange haze beyond Rustico fields, when it was time for Gallant to take the stage in his family’s church atop the South Rustico hill.

“And now, what you’ve all been waiting for,” said the president of le Conseil Acadien de Rustico and emcee of the night, Michelle Pineau. “It is a tremendous pleasure to present to you award-winning singer-songwriter and Rustico’s own, Monsieur Lennie Gallant!”

Uproarious applause welcomed the smiling songster as he entered, guitar in hand, flanked by his two reliable sidemen, Sean Kemp on violin and Jamie Alcorn on guitar.

“Well, we’ve got time for one song,” he said, after the lengthy and complimentary introduction, as the audience laughed.

“This song was written right down by the bay down there,” he added, as began strumming his way into the first number of the night, Seven Years.

In a full and captivating sound (enhanced by the church’s fabulous acoustics), Gallant and his two accompanists wowed the audience from that first chord onward and took them to a place they didn’t want to leave, song and song again, for the next hour and a half.

On a beautifully-lit stage, amid leafy trees laced with white lights and white candles a-glow, they filled the evening with Gallant hits, like Peter’s Dream, Pieces of You, La Valse des Vagues, Which Way Does the River Run and Going Back to Rustico, while folded program fans fluttered throughout the pews all night long, waving as if dancing in constant time to the music.

What felt like 35 degree heat (or even 40 degrees in the balcony) though, was not going to stand in the way of the crowd’s enjoyment of the night. And it soon became clear that the church could very well have begun to burst into flames and the dedicated and delighted audience would not have budged their bums from the benches.

Gallant’s voice sounded as impeccable as ever and, with some incredible flourish violin playing from Kemp and superb guitar leads from Alcorn, I thought the caliber of performance was unquestionably world class — the kind of thing where you know the regulars can only say, “It just gets better every year.”

I took a step outside at one point to get some air and was greeted by the sight of a whole other group of audience members sitting in lawn chairs outside the church door, swatting mosquitoes as they savoured the music.

An almost-full moon lit up the night as it reflected off the river and I listened to the music outside the church.

“Man, this guy’s got a lot of hits,” is all I could declare as he then tore into The Band’s Still Playing, and I came back in to catch the last of his performance.

An immediate standing ovation brought him back to play three more fantastic songs, including When I Build My Boat and Only Love, as an encore to bring a finale to the all-out rumbling Rustico rendez-vous that it was.

Check out www.lenniegallant.com for all the info on the man, the artist, the pride of P.E.I., Monsieur Lennie Gallant. And, if you didn’t get to the show this year, then remember: book your tickets early for next year.

And bring a fan.