Winterlude festivities are in full swing from Feb. 1 – 17, with enough fun and seasonal celebrations for everybody in the National Capital Region.
Chantal Comeau, a media relations officer for the National Capital Commission (NCC), says the goal of this year’s festival is to generate a sense of joy and comfort during Canada’s harshest time of year.
“This is all about how communities dance and play music to entertain themselves during winter,” she says.
“It’s all in the tradition of having fun.”
To kick off the excitement, a high-energy opening number will play every Friday and Saturday at 7 p.m. at the American Express Snowbowl on the Rideau Canal Skateway.
Hip-hop artist K-OS and indie rock group Joel Plaskett Emergency will headline the event
The show will also feature 88 pyrotechnical effects, techno-traditional music by group Swing, hip-hop dancing by Lynx & Krypto, Inuit cultural performers, bagpiping by members of the Campbell Brothers, and snow queen puppets measuring over four metres high by Noreen Young, .
The dazzling production pays tribute to the 400th anniversary of Quebec City with music in French and English.
All of the performers are Canadian.
“It’s a very fun show and everybody’s so enthusiastic,” says Greg Solinger, part of the Montreal break-dancing duo Lynx and Krypto.
Comeau says the NCC, in collaboration with artistic director Matt Zimbel, aimed to make the show as eclectic and flashy as possible.
“The visuals are all very lively and very Canadian,” she says.
To make the production more visible to audience members situated far back from the stage, Comeau says Zimbel and the NCC designed a dancing “Rigaudon” – a traditional wooden toy with swinging arms and legs – measuring almost five metres high to entertain all ages.
Marilyn Tagoona, an event planner who specializes in aboriginal performances, provided the Inuit drummers and singers for the production.
She says artistic director Zimbel loves the cultural aspect and sound of Inuit throat singing – a very unusual, guttural duet where singers Becky Mearns and Charlotte Quaminaq echo each other on split second intervals.
The effect of the performance, Tagoona says, is memorable.
“It really warms you up inside,” she says.
In addition to music and dance performances, Winterlude 2008 features family skating on the Rideau Canal as well as activities for the whole family at the Sun Life Snowflake Kingdom in Gatineau’s Jacques-Cartier Park.
Visitors can meet the festival’s official mascots, the Ice Hog family, who play on giant snow slides and navigate a snow labyrinth.
Moreover, in collaboration with the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs, festival goers can learn about traditional aboriginal winter inventions and maple syrup making, as well as take part in an ice fishing workshop with the Quebec Ministry of Natural Resources.
During the second weekend of Winterlude, members of the public can marvel at snow sculptures by teams of carvers and designers representing each Canadian province and territory.
The theme of this year’s National Snow Sculpture Competition is “Northern Creations,” where teams draw upon artistic influences unique to their part of Canada.
Last year's edition of Winterlude attracted an estimated 650,000 visitors, many of them from out of town.
The NCC expects similar numbers this year, as long as the weather conditions permit.