This past Saturday was World Fiddle Day and the Kole Crook Fiddle Association got in on the fun, as they do every year.
Undeterred by the wildfire, the association hosted its annual concert at the Enterprise Community Hall for a small, but enthusiastic and appreciative group of people who are staying in the community as evacuees. The hall is being used as an evacuation site as crews continue to battle the wildfire.
Linda Duford, the association’s director, said this year was just the latest in a line of challenging years.
“In 2022, we were just recovering from the catastrophic flood and a few of us got together in the (Aurora Ford) arena parking lot,” she said. “In 2021, we had to do it by Zoom (and) in 2020, we were down on the river bank six feet apart.”
Even with all that was going on, Duford said she was determined that the fire and evacuations weren’t going to stop the show from going on.
“You get to the point where you think ‘Okay, bring it on, we’re ready’,” she said.
The only thing left to figure out was how many fiddlers would be performing at the evacuation centre. Duford estimated she would have five, but there ended up being more than just five people.
“We ended up with four fiddlers, two guitarists and a group of young ones on the tambourines,” she said.
The group played several tunes and pieces in Metis and old-time fiddling, the traditional styles of the North, said Duford, and it was very well-received.
“I definitely knew this would lift the spirits of the evacuees,” she said. “We even got a fiddle dance going and people were up dancing and cheering. It was great.”
So for the past four years, something has happened that caused the association to get creative in World Fiddle Day celebrations. That hasn’t been lost on Duford, who is anticipating something could happen in 2024.
She’s even started a betting pool of sorts to see what circumstances could happen next year.
“Maybe a meteorite or part of the International Space Station falling into Great Slave Lake or locusts,” she said with a laugh.