MUSIC
 |
 |
Rose Cousins grew up on a potato farm in rural Prince Edward Island and learned to play the family piano by ear through listening to and recording music from the radio and televised movies. As a young girl she wrote poetry and first performed with her mother and sister in church. She bought her first guitar on her nineteenth birthday and began performing at an open mic in Halifax, while she was pursuing her secondary education. In 2005, with the support of CBC Radio Halifax, Cousins released her first recording, If You Were For Me. Rose joined musical colleagues Jill Barber and Meaghan Smith and partnered with CBC Radio Halifax again in the fall of 2007 to record a collection of Christmas songs called A New Kind of Light. The project, which also included a sold-out concert, helped to raise $161,000 for food banks throughout the Maritimes. This past February, she won an East Coast Music Award for Female Recording of the Year.
Lennie Gallant and Rose Cousins, who both now live in Halifax, will be back on the Island for the Victoria Day weekend concert hosted by CBC Radio. This is the first time the two performers have partnered for a concert. Each will have their own full band of accompaniment with them. The entertainment kicks off at 8 pm and will be hosted by CBC’s Matt Rainnie and Heidi Petracek. CBC will donate the proceeds of this event to the Summerside Boys and Girls Club.
From his early childhood, growing up in a very musical family in Rustico, PEI Lennie Gallant was surrounded by music, stories, and drama. A vast array of jobs, including being a truck driver, an actor, a housepainter and more, exposed him to many walks of life before he began playing music full time. Since then he has released seven albums, including one French recording and has won a host of awards and nominations from both the Juno's and the East Coast Music Awards. He writes songs that depict his varied life experiences and wide musical background. In 2004 Gallant was inducted into the Order of Canada and was recognized for garnering “much respect for his hard hitting songs chronicling the lives of people dealing with tremendous adversity and serious issues.” Some of his most popular songs are “Peter’s Dream,” “The Gypsy Wind,” and “When We Get There,” to name but a few.
CBC Radio will record the concert for future programming including CANADA LIVE, which airs nightly on CBC Radio 2, and on Atlantic Airwaves on CBC Radio One.