A crowd in Surrey was first to see, hear and sing along to a new all-Canadian concert created by the Piano Heist duo of Patrick Courtin and Nico Rhodes.
Sadly, Surrey Arts Centre’s 400-seat Main Stage theatre was only half full for the debut of their entertaining and very interactive Great Canadian Sing-A-Long show on Saturday, Jan. 31.
Lyrics for a wide range of Canadian hits — from Stan Rogers’ old “Barrett’s Privateers” to The Weeknd’s newish “Blinding Lights” — were shown on a big screen above two talented Vancouver Islanders as Courtin played piano and Rhodes introduced songs and conducted a choir of audience members.
They invited two women to play a game on stage during “The Hockey Song,” gave blow-up guitars to four guys for Shania Twain’s “Man! I Feel Like a Woman,” rocked keytars (with “ketyar” misspelled on screen) and breathed life into handheld melodicas.
Rocking songs by Trooper, BTO and Spirit of the West made the cut, but slower, more folky numbers ruled the night including “Heart of Gold,” “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” and “Hallelujah,” the Leonard Cohen show-closer.
The vibe would have been better with, say, “Ahead By A Century” by The Tragically Hip, not “Bobcaygeon,” but with so many great Canadian songs to draw from, it’s a tough to pick.
Lifelong pals and now pro musicians, Courtin and Rhodes handle a crowd with ease and banter well as Piano Heist, launched in 2022. They have a growing number of shows with different themes, and The Great Canadian Sing-A-Long (or Sing Along Eh?, as shown on screen) debuted in Surrey as a more family-focused afternoon concert Jan. 31, followed by another that evening.
It was a fun night out and good history lesson about the huge Canadian catalogue of pop songs, sung with pride by an eager crowd.
“Traditionally,” Rhodes told me pre-concert, “we perform as a comedy-instrumental duo that plays everything from pop and rock to, you know, classical, duets, a whole range. We were approached by Surrey Arts Centre about creating a show where people sing together.
“We’re very much inspired by the group the Canadian group Choir Choir Choir, who are doing phenomenal things,” Rhodes continued. “So we thought, ‘We’re both choir directors, we’re both conductors and arrangers. We both believe in the beauty of singing together. So right away we were onboard, and the idea of a Canadian sing-along really appealed to us.”