Rock The Peach’s First annual Music Festival will go down in Penticton British Columbia’s history as a stellar event of fantastic Artists, fun entertainment for everyone, great hosts, and super organization.
I didn’t see anyone not having a great time. iRock Entertainment Producer Willi Jahnke got it right appealing to the vast demographic of the festival goers. The main entertainment artists spanned the last five decades.
The music festival opened Friday with the Battle To Rock The Peach contest winners The Malibu Knights on the Freestone stage. An incredible Indie Band out of Kelowna, B.C. with special guest Devon Coyote. Not exactly novices having been touring for at least three years and hundreds of shows, The Malibu Knights will be a group we will definitely hear more of ! The Steadies, also a great Canadian Act, Grooved the crowd and put on an amazing show, I can only tell you how great these acts are. You have to see them LIVE.Earl Pereira was originally from Wide Mouth mason and he has brought his groove to a new audience. Next a band from Vancouver Island, Jets Overhead were a last minute replacement for Treble charger. What a fun and entertaining group. They did meet and greets.
The headliners for Friday was Collective Soul a Southern Rock band out of Atlanta Georgia U.S.A. Amazing talent, Collective Soul is one of my all time favorites. Ed Roland’s and Collective Soul’s music is destined to be longtime classics. All were on The Freestone Stage.
Saturday had another epic line up of great talent. Good for Grapes performed on the Redhaven Stage. Andrew Allen was great on the Freestone stage and back over to Redhaven for fun country, rockabilly artist Ridley Bent, This band was a lot of fun to see and hear.
Three great acts from the 1960’s, 1970’s and then a jump to 2000.
Three Dog Night, War and then Headliners The Sam Roberts Band. Music for everyone. Three Dog Night’s performance was that of a group of Veteran artists that literally blew us away. They sang a new song a capella called Prayer and we were floored by the performance. Cory Wells and Danny Hutton’s vocals are still amazing. All their great hits from 1969 through the 1970’s and newer ones were played for a very appreciative audience. Three Dog Night have almost all their original members.
WAR with original keyboardist Lonnie Jordan is keeping WAR alive and their great hits Cisco Kid, Low Rider and Why Can’t We Be Friends. These are more timeless classics. Keep it Alive Lonnie ! Grooving to that Soul, Funk and Jazz hits from the 1970’s . We had a Blast !
Headliners The Sam Roberts Band with more family friendly groove , happy Rock Tunes is today one of Canada’s top artists. Sam has stellar talent and sings beautifully. The younger crowd of teens and twenty-somethings love Sam Roberts but his music is appealing to everyone and the fans of Three Dog Night and WAR were there to enjoy it. We let the younger kids up front. It was fun just watching them. Sam Came out after and signed his vinyl record cover for me. Lonnie Jordan from WAR autographed one and Michael Allsup from Three Dog Night did too. Thank-you.
Sunday’s line-up was as stellar as the first two days. Free City Collective, fun younger appealing music, then another favorite of mine, Blackie and The Rodeo Kings entertained us wildly. This band with the three main artists do a Country- Rock show that is for everyone! Thanks , the meet and greet was a blast! Walk Off The Earth is famous for their You Tube song where they all play one guitar. An amazing fun band, again for all ages. One band Close to my heart because I’m a Veteran, Is Glass Tiger. Amazing show and their song The Thin Red Line always moves me. Again, thanks for the autographs everyone! Jesse Cook and his band played an amazing style of World Music. Jesse from Toronto is backed by a mostly Central and South American group of amazing artists. ‘ The Rumba Foundation’ his latest album is excellent and the music got everyone dancing.
Top Billing was Ronnie Dunn of Brooks and Dunn Fame. WOW ‘A Cowboy in and Rock and Roll Band‘. Again the audience was up dancing and having the best time ever. Ronnie and his band were fantastic! He has a super light show, cool videos and the finale was over the top with the blanket of streamers. No meet and greet but the show was epic ! Thanks Ronnie.
Fringe Festival Players, Kumbana Band, The Myth Maker troupe, Adam Fitzpatrick, Super Elvis impersonator, dancers and all kinds of friendly hosts and greeters. RCMP on site with a great security company too to help. All were so friendly and helpful. Special thanks to all the volunteers too. I would say an absolute success. We had an incredibly great time .
Thanks to all the organizers, volunteers, the Vendors , Sponsors , On and ON the Thank you list goes out.
A Stellar Weekend of fun. You have to Experience it LIVE !
Paul Fitzgerald
Monday, September 17th’s show at Abbotsford’s Entertainment and Sports Centre had everyone wondering, ” are the Stone Temple Pilots going to play??” Yes they will and they did. I kept very optimistic. I had deja vu, it was GNR all over again. They were there, they played and it was fabulous !
