Also this week: Music PEI Awards nominees are announced, Elora Riverfest calls it quits, Folk North invites submissions for its FAI showcases and a new single and video from Beverly Glenn-Copeland.
This past weekend, MusicNL celebrated the province’s artists and industry leaders at the 2025 MusicNL Awards Gala, held at the St. John’s Convention Centre. Leading the winners list with two awards apiece were Kelly McMichael, Nick Earle and the Reckless Hearts, Deantha Edmunds, XIA-3, and Quote the Raven.
MusicNL also celebrated many first-time award recipients, including Zaynab Wilson (R&B Artist of the Year), Smoke Signals (Loud Artist of the Year), Andrew Gosse (Electronic Artist of the Year), and Evan Watts Smith (Rising Star of the Year).
The evening featured 25 award presentations, including the prestigious MusicNL Board of Directors Lifetime Achievement Award, presented to Dave Panting. Performers includedDeantha Edmunds, Kelly McMichael, Liz Fagan Band, Mallory Johnson, Natasha Blackwood, Nick Earle & The Reckless Hearts, The Irish Descendants, With Violet, XIA- 3, Zaynab Wilson and Dave Panting.
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The gala was part of MusicNL Week, a 5-day celebration of music and industry development featuring 40 showcase performances, over 20 panels and workshops, more than 1700 curated business meetings, and 38 awards presentations across artists, industry, and the previously announced MusicNL Honorary Award Winners. The event concluded with the Songwriters’ Circle on Sunday, Nov. 15 at The Ship with Sherry Ryan, Faith Aucoin, Baraka and Justin Fancy, winner of the VOCM Fan’s Choice Entertainer of the Year.
See a full list of 2025 MusicNL Award Winners here.
– Music PEI recently announced the nominees for the 25th anniversary 2026 Music PEI Awards. Topping the list this year are Logan Richard and Lennie Gallant, with five nods each, followed by Diana Delirio, Richard WOOD, siddhu sneh and Tiffany Liu with four apiece. Other notable nominees include Shane Pendergast, KINLEY, Absolute Losers and Two Hours Traffic.
This year’s celebration includes special recognition for Teresa Doyle, recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award (Presented by the City of Summerside). The awards gala will return to the Harbourfront Theater in Summerside, back to where it all began in 2001. Public voting for two fan-favorite categories—the Ocean 100 and Hot 105.5 Entertainer of the Year and Club Red Productions Music Video of the Year—is under way, and runs until Dec. 15. Fans can cast their votes on the Ocean 100 and Hot 105.5 websites (link here).
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Music PEI Week will take place from Feb. 28 to March 7, 2026. For the full list of nominees, voting links, and to purchase festival passes, visit musicpei.com
Festivals News
Ontario summer festival Riverfest Elora is shutting down. Its Facebook post this week stated that "It’s with heavy hearts that we say goodbye to Riverfest Elora. For 15 years, this festival brought music, art, and community together in ways we will never forget. The reality is stark: costs have surged, revenues have fallen behind, and the changing festival landscape has made it impossible to sustain the model we’ve fought to keep alive. Thank you to everyone who made Riverfest Elora possible. The memories we created together will always remain."
Over its run, Riverfest attracted such major acts as Blue Rodeo, The Flaming Lips, Bruce Cockburn, Metric, Violent Femmes, Monster Truck, Sam Roberts Band, Charles Bradley, Fleet Foxes, MGMT and many more. This year's headliners were Silversun Pickups, Fitz and the Tantrums and City and Colour.
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Industry News
NXNE is joining the European Talent Exchange, a move designed to strengthen the connection between Canada and Europe’s live music scenes and create more opportunities for emerging artists to reach brand-new audiences. Exchange collaborates closely with showcase festival Eurosonic Noorderslag (ESNS). Once an artist is booked at ESNS, they automatically enter the Exchange program — meaning bookers from 130+ partner festivals catch their set and decide who they want to bring to their own stages.
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– MusicOntario and Folk Canada are uniting under the FOLK NORTH banner to host three nights of private showcases at 2026's Folk Alliance International (FAI), the world’s largest gathering of the folk music industry and community (it runs Jan. 21-25 in New Orleans).. The deadline to apply here is Nov. 30. Notable alumni of these showcases include include The Strumbellas, Amanda Rheaume, Abigail Lapell, Julian Taylor, Tim Chaisson, AHI, Skye Wallace, Jeremy Dutcher, Aysanabee, Shakura S’Aida, Terra Lightfoot, Kaia Kater, Elisapie, OKAN and many more.
Artists News
Canadian indie rock favourites Rheostatics return to the spotlight with the release of a new album on Friday (Nov. 21). Out via Cordova Bay, Records, The Great Lakes Suite sees the band celebrating their 45th anniversary with a highly ambitious project. The album features eighteen tracks of (mostly) improvised music and spoken word, performed by longtime members Dave Bidini, Dave Clark, Don Kerr, and Tim Vesely, with newer additions Kevin Hearn and Hugh Marsh alongside famed Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson.
Recorded over two spontaneous sessions in Toronto, The Great Lakes Suite also features a star-studded list of collaborators, including Polaris Prize winnerTanya Tagaq, groundbreaking U.S. musician Laurie Anderson, poet and storyteller Chief Stacey LaForme, poets Anne Carson and Liz Howard, fiddler and singer Kendel Carson, singer-songwriter Maiah Wynne (Envy of None) and the late Gord Downie.
Dave Bidini describes the inspiration for the album this way: “Whereas in the past we made music inspired by Canadian landscape paintings, this time we decided to go straight to the source. What better muse than the beauty, power, and spirit of the Great Lakes, upon whose shores we all grew up? Making music around such vast ideas was a huge challenge, one we answered by inviting some of the finest musicians we know to come together and play unplanned, unscripted, and completely in the moment.”
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The album will be launched this week with two sold-out concerts at TD Music Hall in Toronto, Nov. 21 and 22, with acclaimed documentary film makers Jennifer Baichwal and Nick DePencier on hand, contributing projections, and the spirit of improvisation to the fore.
– Internationally-renowned composer and vocalist Beverly Glenn-Copeland will release a new album, Laughter in Summer, on February 6, 2026, and he has just put out the title track as a single and live video (filmed in England). The track is a duet between Glenn-Copeland and his partner, eco-poet, theatre actor and producer Elizabeth Copeland.
