Tired of the snow and cold, wet weather?
The Rotary Club of Port Coquitlam Centennial invites you to chase the blues away at a winter blues festival later this month at Riverside secondary school.
Sponsored in part by The Tri-City News, the music concert and dance features some of the best blues, R&B, soul and funk acts in the Lower Mainland such as Port Moody’s Diane Lines, a musician in the late Dal Richards orchestra who will headline the PoCo show.
Also in the lineup are Steve “Mug Dog” Sainas, the founder of the Rock School program at Terry Fox secondary and a Juno-award winner for his teaching talent, and R&B Allstars and Incognito.
Centennial club president Barrie Seaton said support for the Feb. 26 festival has been “phenomenal. As soon as everybody hears where the proceeds are going to, they’ve cleared their schedules.”
The club, which is marking its 12th year, only started sponsoring the Starfish Pack initiative last month.
Over the past six weeks, its members have helped to feed 13 PoCo students at two schools, loading their backpacks full of food —courtesy of Save-On-Foods on Ottawa Street — on Thursdays and distributing them on Fridays, for family meals on the weekends.
“When we heard about the need in our own community, we could not believe it,” said Ron Goyette, a Centennial past president and organizer of the winter blues fest.
Added Seaton, “We’re all in favour of feeding the hungry overseas but when you hear about the need right at home, people are more likely to respond. And that’s what we’re doing.”
Goyette said the club hopes to raise around $20,000 for the cause, which costs $525 per student per academic year.
He said the club members chose to host a winter production to avoid competition with other fundraisers in the spring and summer. “It’s different from what anybody else is doing,” Goyette said.
• Tickets for the Winter Blues Festival on Feb. 26, from 2 to 9 p.m., are $45 through http://tinyurl.com/hcxadzy. Food will be served by the Riverside secondary culinary students with drinks (at a cash bar) poured by Northpaw from Coquitlam and West Coast Cider in Port Coquitlam.
