The History and Heart behind Ontario Small Halls
Small Halls started intimately and beautifully In August 2014, on a super moon weekend. Inspired by the spirit of community, hospitality, and exceptional music that has made small halls festivals in Prince Edward Island and Australia such treasured events, the talented and dedicated team that organizes the award-winning Ottawa Bluesfest (July) and CityFolk (September) launched the inaugural Ontario Festival of Small Halls with the talented and charming Old Man Luedecke from Nova Scotia. This first year saw shows performed in three intimate venues in Perth, Gananoque, and Bloomfield. It was a tentative, but great first step!
The festival’s first expansion took place in 2015 when it jumped to fourteen beloved small-town locations across Leeds, Grenville and Lanark County in Eastern Ontario. Cherished halls engrained in the fabric of their communities played host to first-rate performers like The Strumbellas, The Good Lovelies, Corb Lund, The East Pointers, Beòlach, Fortunate Ones, Gordie MacKeeman and His Rhythm Boys and Kelly Prescott. These musicians stepped off the big stage to travel to small towns, to be ushered into historic buildings at the heart of some of Ontario’s most vibrant communities and greeted with all the warmth of a small-town welcome. The host organizations threw themselves into the festival. They put on community dinners and country markets. They sold tickets, decorated the halls, offered local openers, and spread the word. Twelve of the festival’s fifteen shows sold out that year, and the musicians delivered intimate, jaw-dropping performances complete with lots of laughter, foot stomping, storytelling, dancing, and downright musical magic.
In 2016, the festival expanded to include twenty-four communities, welcoming new villages to take part including Maxville, Athens, Burritt’s Rapids, Elgin, Pakenham, Winchester, and more. Canadian favourites like Basia Bulat, Elliott Brood, Sheesham & Lotus and Son, Kelly Sloan, Brock Zeman, Harrow Fair, Sherman Downey and Matthew Byrne, Jim Bryson, The Abrams, Miss Emily and many more graced the small stages. International artists including Breabach, Hat Fitz and Cara and Darlingside attended for the first time, playing to sold-out crowds, with many of their new fans hearing them for the first time.
Ten more locations were added to the festival circuit in 2017, including Dunvegan, Alexandria, Merrickville, Kilmaurs, Dacre, Tamworth, Toledo, Balderson, Renfrew and Tatlock. They all jumped on board to open their doors to Small Halls shows and what a success they were! Artists like Ashley MacIsaac, Jenn Grant, Rose Cousins, Great Lake Swimmers, The Outside Track, Change of Step, The Abrams, Les Poules à Colin, Dave Gunning, Old Man Luedecke, Rosie & the Riveters, Jessica Wedden, Sacha, Julia Finnegan, Ian Sherwood, Jillian Kerr and many more, wowed audiences.
The festival kept growing and 2018 was a big year. Not only was the festival now in thirty-three locations, but a new bit of magic was also introduced at Kilmaurs: the Chef’s Table, a local farm-to-table feast. The festival was also recognized with the award for Best Small Festival at the CMW Live Music Industry Awards. During the fall, artists like Colter Wall, Kathleen Edwards, Stephen Fearing, Barney Bentall, Lindi Ortega, Jim Bryson, Skydiggers and Basia Bulat played to sold out crowds. The new Deck the Halls Series was expanded to offer nine holiday shows including the festival’s first show at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa, featuring Matt Andersen, Suzie Vinnick and Donovan Woods.
The Chef’s Table events proved so popular that they were expanded to six unique locations in 2019: Saunders Farm, Pinhey’s Point, Stanley’s Olde Maple Farm, Brown’s Inlet and Cumberland Heritage Museum. The fall festival was held in thirty-four locations and performance highlights included The East Pointers, Lee Harvey Osmond, Madison Violet, Justin Rutledge, Harry Manx, The Weather Station, LEAHY and the Devin Cuddy Band. The holidays series was the most popular to date with Deck the Halls including thirteen shows featuring Fortunate Ones, The Once, Coig and Royal Wood (and a marriage proposal on stage in Tweed! She said yes.).
The 2020 Festival saw epic pivots during a world-wide pandemic to reimagine what it was capable of producing. We started off the year producing an intriguing free podcast, working with local storytellers in a dozen of our Small Halls communities to record authentic tales from across Eastern Ontario. Small Halls also worked with municipalities and health authorities to create our own health protocols and guidelines to ensure a safe and distanced festival in October. We focused on three locations: Almonte Old Town Hall, Seeley’s Bay Community Hall and Brockville’s St. John’s United Church and welcomed artists who hadn’t been on stage for months – and live music enthusiasts who hadn’t been to a show in close to a year. It was all at once a surreal, cautious and intensely happy experience. We welcomed Hannah Georgas, Hawksley Workman, Great Lake Swimmers, Ben Caplan, NQ Arbuckle, The Abrams, Devin Cuddy, Wild Rivers, Nambi, Theo Tams, and Johnny Shay. The Festival also brought its popular Chef’s Table series to life on the patio at the National Arts Centre, where world-class Canadian chefs created masterpieces with local food – all accented by a band on a boat.
In 2021, the festival put on more than thirty-five shows across Eastern Ontario. Small Halls was fully back from the pandemic year. Audiences responded to our vision of bringing big music to small places, thriving on the outpouring of enthusiasm from musicians, communities, and audience members who have come together from across the world, across Canada, and across town to make the festival such a success.
With the intent to bring back audiences impacted by the pandemic years, the Small Halls team staged for the first time a 2022 Spring series that was much welcomed! People exiting the shows expressed so much gratitude for again experiencing the wonderment of live music in their communities. Some fifteen shows at twelve venues were organized, featuring a stellar lineup that included Kaia Kater, Great Lake Swimmers, Chris Murphy, Basia Bulat, Harrow Fair, Ashley MacIsaac, Jessica Pearson & The East Wind and Hawksley Workman.
In the Fall of 2022, the Small Halls team went on to stage some thirty-two shows in twenty-three community venues. The lineup inspired and brought much joy to capacity audiences and included performances by the Skydiggers, Còig, Hawksley Workman, Beòlach’s Wendy MacIsaac & Mac Morin, Devin Cuddy Band, Royal Wood, Quote The Raven, Charlie A’Court, Inn Echo, Suzie Vinnick, Madison Violet, Irish Mythen, Ashley MacIsaac, The Barra MacNeils, Kellie Loder, Cassie & Maggie, The Irish Descendants, Elliott BROOD, Ron Sexsmith, Jim Bryson and The Angelique Francis Quartet.
Small Halls in 2023 was a pivotal year! From its Eastern Ontario base, the festival expanded westward to the Peterborough-Kawartha Lakes region, thanks to new partnerships forged with communities and their intimate halls in Norwood, Fenella, Pontypool, Omemee, Lakehurst and the splendid downtown Peterborough Showplace Centre. This amazing edition of Festival of Small Halls featured some thirty-nine shows in thirty-five venues from October through to the Holidays Season. Another great lineup which brought much good cheer to highly appreciative audiences! The ’23 line-up featured the great talents of East Coast Experience, Còig, Stephen Fearing, Ron Sexsmith, Brooks & Bowskill, Kellylee Evans, Mia Kelly, Corb Lund, The Once, Devin Cuddy Band, Harry Manx, Matthew Good, Mikhail Laxton, Terra Lightfoot, The Irish Descendants, Julian Taylor, Jenn Grant, Old Man Luedecke, Ben Caplan, Spoons, Quote The Raven, The Arrogant Worms, Charlie Cunningham, Kim Mitchell, and The Abrams.
The 2024 edition of the Ontario Festival of Small Halls was indeed a monumental one. Sixty shows in some fifty-six venues were produced this year and new audiences and community partners were introduced to the ambient magic of Small Halls shows. The Small Halls team, tech crews, and community volunteers met the challenge of staging the festival in communities across eight hundred kilometres of picturesque Ontario landscape. The festival featured another incredible mix of wonderful talent, including Ron Sexsmith, Steve Hill, Harry Manx, Sarah Harmer, Jeff Rogers, Kellylee Evans, Basia Bulat, Hawksley Workman, East Coast Experience, Kathleen Edwards, Tom Cochrane Duo, Suzie Vinnick, Fred Eaglesmith, The Trews Acoustic Trio, Ashley MacIsaac, The Barra MacNeils, Royal Wood, Ryan Young Duo, Lynne Hanson, Tom Wilson Tehohàhake Trio, Brooks & Bowskill, Pokey LaFarge, Miss Emily, Skydiggers, Chantal Kreviazuk, and Glass Tiger.
For 2025, after the wonderful, but geographically extensive previous year’s edition, Festival of Small Halls is staging forty-five shows with the exceptional talents of : AHI, The Pairs, Chantal Kreviazuk, The Rowdymen, Irish Mythen, The Arrogant Worms, Ashley MacIsaac, Bright Strings Community Fiddle Orchestra, Mia Kelly, Blair Dunlop, Sarah Hagen, Devon Cuddy Duo, Sam Polley and The Old Tomorrows, Danny Michel, Junkhouse, Corb Lund, Hawksley Workman, Ben Caplan, The Once, Whitehorse, and Tim Baker.
A new feature for 2025 is the Small Halls’ Music In The Schools program. Ten participating elementary schools from Ottawa through to the Peterborough area will host wonderful Small Halls live music performances during school hours. These will be a delightful mix of engaging entertainment and music education. The reception for this initiative has been truly enthusiastic by teachers and school administrations, and it is hoped that ensuing years will see more and more schools participate.
The annual Chef’s Table series continues to be a terrific supportive event for Small Halls. This “farm-to-table feast” features menus curated by Chef Kenton Leier of the National Arts Centre, who invites Canada’s finest guest chefs for a culinary experience par excellence. This multi-weekend event will continue to showcase world-class chefs and great live music, from the patio of the NAC’s 1 Elgin Restaurant, by Ottawa’s gorgeous Rideau Canal.
Like all Festival of Small Halls shows, the Chef’s Table series is truly magical.
The Ontario Festival of Small Hall’s story is still unfolding – so stay tuned! One thing is for sure: there will be many more unforgettable moments of music in well-loved spaces in a community near you.
In the News…
Festival of Small Halls Brings Big Music to Small Towns in Ontario – Life in Pleasantville
A Festival of Small Halls Experience: A Musical and Community Adventure – Ottawa Day Tripper