AFTER 20 years of playing together as Madison Violet, Lisa MacIsaac and Brenley MacEachern have it down. In particular, they have the harmonies down.

They’re up there with Simon & Garfunkel, Lennon & McCartney, Crosby, Stills & Nash.

And that started right from the beginning.

“Lisa auditioned for my band (Zoebliss) one night in Toronto,” MacEachern said. “She was only playing fiddle at that time.

“So, she came over to my place and I put some guitar and vocals on a looper.

“I went upstairs to get us a drink and I heard this incredible harmony to my tracks.

“It was her.”

That band broke up but as a duo they’ve continued on through nine albums, numerous awards and nominations and a constant touring schedule. They just returned from three weeks in Germany and stopped in to The Crossing Pub in Sharbot Lake Friday night. This was their third or fourth time in town, Nobody seems to remember.

But nobody that was there Friday night will forget those harmonies.

It might be surprising that their music is so folk-oriented given that both have Maritime music roots.

Yes, MacIsaac is Ashley MacIsaac’s sister but she is not Natalie MacMaster’s cousin.

“Natalie lived maybe five houses down and we did go to the same school,” MacIsaac said. “Route 19 was full of fiddlers and we all learned from Stan Chapman.”

MacEachern was born in Montreal and grew up in Kincardine, ON. But her father is from Craigmore, NS.

“Mom can’t sing to save her soul but my father is the singer in the family,” she said.

MacIsaac said that while she grew up on Maritime music and Scottish fiddle tunes (as well as an admitted affinity for the song The Cat Came Back), “I wanted something different so I moved away when I was 19.”

Landing in Toronto, she fell in with the folk scene there and just sort of grew into it naturally.

“When you play a lot of folk festivals, you pick up a lot of things,” she said.

Curiously, one festival they’ve never played is Blue Skies, but they’d like to.

“I’ve heard it’s a lot of fun,” MacIsaac said.

They’d fit right in.

While there were a couple of tables of locals Friday night, most of the audience seemed to be from Ottawa, Brockville, or just elsewhere, opting to spend the night at the Inn after taking in the show.

Clearly, the audience was full of fans and the evening turned into bit of live by request as the girls seemed only too happy to oblige said requests.

In fact, in a crowd-pleasing twist, they even ventured into the audience, saving their (arguably) biggest tune, Crying, for an encore before finishing up with 99 Red Balloons.

Hell, they even covered The Stones earlier on in the evening (Wild Horses).

Christine Fader spent 20 years at Queen’s University as a career counsellor, with a focus on helping students with disabilities. She now runs Career Cupid, which helps people define and achieve their goals, and is the writer of career related books. Her most recent book is ‘Just What The Doctor Ordered’, a detailed primer for students who are seeking to get into medical school.

Before she embarked on her career, Christine took disability studies at Loyalist College, graduating in 1994.

The Premier’s awards honour Ontario college graduates who have made significant contributions in Ontario and around the world. There are seven categories in the award competition and Christine is nominated in the community services category.

“I think I was nominated by Loyalist because my career has demonstrated how the disability studies program can lead to a lot of career opportunities, even if I don’t work directly in developmental services,” she said on Sunday as she was preparing to travel to Toronto for the awards dinner.

She said that these awards are important because they bring to light the accomplishments of people who opt for a college education instead of seeking a university education.

“I worked in a university setting for 20 years, and while Queen’s is a good place to learn, I came across many students, over the years, who would have been better served by a college education,” she said. “A lot of my colleagues thought I came through university because they had bachelor’s and master’s degrees, but the training I had in disability studies at Loyalist served me well.”

Among her accomplishments, she is proud of the work she did over two years, as a community member on the employment standards development committee with the Ontario Ministry of Community and Social Services. The committee developed accessibility legislation that was enacted last year and will roll out over the next few years.

In her current career path, running a home-based business in South Frontenac, she helps people to enter into their chosen career, as a writer as well as a consultant.

While she was flattered by the nomination, Christine did her research and concluded that she was not going to win the award.

“I don’t expect to win but it will be a fun evening. Winners of these awards have some very high-profile achievements. They have started not-for-profit corporations and overcome great obstacles.”

Her prediction did indeed come true. The winner in the community category this year was Kevin Collins. Collins was a poster child for Easter Seals as a young person with Cerebral Palsy, and is now the President and CEO of the Easter Seals Foundation, a post he was appointed to in 2017 after a career in the hospitality industry.

Christine Fader is back in Battersea, living out her dream by helping others accomplish theirs.

“I’m not someone who lies around all day, this is my second speech today and I have a concert tonight,” Drew Cumpson told the audience at Community Living North Frontenac’s 43rd Anniversary Celebration last Thursday night at St. James Major Church Hall.

Cumpson grew up in Frontenac County, attending Hinchinbrooke Public School, Loughborough Public School and Sydenham High School. He had just finished writing his second year university exams when he went to Peru to do humanitarian work (a dental hygiene program).

“We took some of the kids to the park and did some body surfing,” he said. “A wave slammed me into the ocean floor, injuring my C4 vertebrae.

“It left me unable to breathe on my own.”

Cumpson said he doesn’t remember any of it, friends having told him of how they had to take him to hospital in Peru in the back of a police car while friends gave him breathes all the way.

“The body has its own coping mechanisms,” he said. “Without friends telling me I wouldn’t know any of it.

“Thank God for travel insurance. It cost $55,000 for the air ambulance to get me back to Kingston General Hospital.”

As you might expect, it took awhile to get to the point he’s at now. But thanks to the Direct Funding Program, he’s managed to build himself a life and a business.

“I travel — Mexico, Vancouver, several trips to Toronto, since my accident,” he said. “If someone tells me I can’t do something, I’m going to do my best to prove them wrong.”

But, he acknowledges that he needs some help.

“I need care 24/7 as I’m on a ventilator,” he said. “I have eight staff who work for me and my life is in their hands.

“If my ventilator pops off and nobody’s there, I die.”

The Direct Funding Program has allowed him to hire staff, people he’s comfortable with, and even run his own consulting business. For example, he’s doing work for the HIV and AIDS Resource Centre, doing their social media and marketing.

“I’m a huge advocate for disability rights,” he said. “I’m working on a pamphlet on body image and sex.

“I started my business to help other businesses become AODA (Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act) compliant by 2025 because I know what it’s like.”

CLNF executive director Dean Walsh said Cumpson’s story is an inspiring example of what can be done. He said the program Cumpson is on is similar to the Passport Program many CLNF clients are on.

“It allows people and families to purchase services to live in their communities,” he said.

“And, it allows people to have a say in their lives,” said manager of support services Sarah Price.

By way of example, Johnathon Wisteard told of how he’s used his Passport program to indulge his love of trains and pay for transportation to his summer job at the Caboose in Sharbot Lake.

Bob Miller told of how his son Daniel’s Passport Program has bridged the gap from high school (which he attended until age 21, he’s now 32), giving him opportunities he wouldn’t otherwise have had.

“He’s grown, socially and intellectually,” Miller said. “We’ve purchased six to eight hours a week from Community Living for things like life skills, sports, walking on the trail and socializing — which is extremely important.

“Inactivity is not life. The funding has allowed us to round out his life.”

It seemed like it was a pretty quick transition when a Pharmasave sign went up in the former location of a convenience and a bakery in Harrowsmith about a month ago. Two weeks later, the Harrowsmith Pharmasave, owned and managed by Bhavin Patel, opened its doors.

It wasn’t that quick for Patel himself, however.

“I had the property in the summer and hoped to have the store open in September, but there were construction delays and we ended up opening at the beginning of November. I am happy with the way the store looks. Everything is clean and we have all of the space we need to serve the public,” he said.

The wait for Bhavin Patel to open his own pharmacy has been quite a bit longer than a month or two. He emigrated to Canada, from India. After receiving bachelors and masters degrees in the field, he had to re-do his qualifications in Canada. He has worked in Winnipeg, Regina and other locations in the Prairies as well as Scarborough, always hoping to get an opportunity to open his own pharmacy and take control of his own business.

He lives in Kingston now with his wife, a trained engineer, and two children (one of whom is less than two months old) and he was looking for a good location for a pharmacy. Harrowsmith is a good choice because the local community has no pharmacy and the location he found is right on Road 38 near the stop light in town.

So far, he has found that the local community has been very receptive and he has been quick to respond when customers are looking for products that he doesn’t yet have available.

“We have most of the bases covered as far as over the counter medication, supplements, skin and hair care are concerned, but we have room for more in order to help people get what they need in town to avoid having to drive somewhere. I tell people who come in to tell me if they are looking for something that is not here, and if I can I order it in for them and the next customer,” he said.

He is, of course, also able to handle prescription needs for his customers, but knows it will take time for people to switch from their current pharmacy to a new one, even if they live close by.

“If people want to bring their prescriptions to me that is great, obviously, but it has to be something they are comfortable with. I am here to serve the community.”

As a token, Bhavin hands out a re-usable Pharmasave bag with a few products in it to first time customers.

The Pharmacy is open 7 days a week (9am-6pm Mon-Fri / 10am-3pm Sat / 10-2pm Sun)

A grand opening is planned for Friday, December 13th, starting at 11:30am.

Is there really a Mr. Christie? Does the sun shine everyday at Pepperidge Farm? You can’t really trust a wholesome brand these days, can you.

Sometimes you can.

There is a real Mrs. Garrett. Her name is Joyce and she still works in the family bakery that she started 30 years ago, in part of the butcher shop that her husband had opened a few years earlier.

She no longer owns the bakery, which is now a stand-alone business. Her daughter Dawn (Lake) has been with her from the start and owns the business now, and it is as much a family business as it ever was.

“My mother, my aunt, my son and my son-in-law all work here, we like to keep it in the family,” said Dawn Lake on a frosty November morning last week, from the bakery, which is off of the Perth Road (between Inverary and the Loughborough Lake boat launch).

It was warm and bright in the bake shop, however. The pie dough, which had been put up early in the morning, was ready. Fay Legrow was forming circles of dough into butter tart trays, the dough for pies was still on the counter. Joyce Garrett was wrapping some goods that had cooled, and Dillon Lake and Christopher Green were consulting about the rest of the day’s baking list.

A lot of people know about Mrs. Garretts mainly because of the butter tarts, which are sold throughout South Frontenac. They are the most popular item the bakery makes, and they make a lot of them, 300 dozen a week on average, more in the summer and in the holiday seasons like pre-Christmas. That comes pretty close to 200,000 butter tarts a year, each made by hand using home-made dough and filling. The recipe, you guessed it, is a closely guarded family secret.

Mrs. Garrett’s has undergone changes over the last few years. Not only are they making a wider variety of items, but the bakery itself has changed.

“When the butcher shop closed a couple of years ago, we thought about closing up the retail store and moving the bakery somewhere else to just do wholesale. But people kept knocking on the door wanting to come in and buy our baking,” said Dawn Lake.

Early last summer (2018) Dawn decided to listen to the customers and rejuvenate the retail business. Instead of moving, she purchased the property and slowly began to open up more and more of a bakery storefront, and add some new oven capacity.

“We are not done yet, but we are getting more and more traffic into the store as time goes on, and every time we let people know about something new that we are baking, they come here from all over,” she said.

There is also a growing corner in the store with sauces and crafts from local producers. All part of Mrs. Garrett’s becoming a destination store for lovers of local baked goods.

Mrs. Garrett’s butter tarts, and some other items, are available at Ormsbees Mercantile, Trousdale’s Foodland, Leonard’s, Northway Home Hardware and locations in Kingston. A larger selection is available at Glenburnie Grocery, but only at the bakery itself are the full range of goods on display.

Holiday seasons are always busy, of course and each of them is different.

“At Thanksgiving it’s pies, apple pie and pumpkin pie, mostly,” said Dawn.

But the volume can be daunting, especially because pies need to be fresh. That was where the strong staff and capacity of the bake shop kitchen comes in. They made about 700 pies this year, fresh for eating, in two days.

“We’ve done that many for a few years, but now we don’t have to work 16-hour days as much because we have the oven space we need,” she said.

With more capacity comes the opportunity to put out more baked goods, and sales have been increasing continuously.

“We do a lot of different things when it comes around to Christmas, including our own Christmas cake and plum pudding. We also do a lot of trays for customers. There is always a lot for Christmas and as we add new products it is only getting busier and busier. It’s exciting.”

And that’s not a bad situation for a business that is over 30 years old.

Back in the day, John Fradenburgh was part of the Toronto music scene. These days, he runs a coffee house/music store in Northbrook.

The musician in him remains strong as does his desire to play with other musicians. That’s probably why he invites a bunch of them over on the third Friday of each month (from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.) for a bit of a jam. Essentially everyone’s invited, whether you play or not.

“I go back a million years, playing in rock’n’roll bands in the ’60s and ’70s (such as Donnie and the Corvairs),” he said. “I was known as a drop-in drummer — anything, any style.

“I was even in a polka band.”

These days, he’s pretty much settled in on bass, but he can play most instruments.

“I got tired of lugging drums around,” he said. “And on drums, you don’t get your name in lights.

“And, you’re in the back and if you get flashed, you have to be paying attention.

“I’ve been flashed about 20 times and each time I wasn’t paying attention.”

He did spend many years in the garage business (“I’m still a licenced mechanic”), from 1976 to 1990 in Brampton and Mississauga. But he and his wife at the time bought a cottage on 41 just north of Bon Echo.

“My wife always wanted a Yarn Store so we opened up Log Cabin Yarns,” he said. “I said ‘let’s start a music store’ so we were music and yarn.

“In 2012, my wife left and I didn’t want yarn so we just started selling coffee.”

Fradenburgh is hardly a newcomer to the local music scene however. He and a group of friends started up The Old Farts and were known to play regularly in places like the old Northbrook Hotel. They also hosted an open mike there.

But, as bands do, that one sort of dissolved of natural causes and this past spring, he decided to start up monthly jams again with Spill the Beanz becoming magnetic north for such things.

“We started off with country but I’m a rocker, Johnny B. Goode,” he said. “But I’ve learned a few country tunes.”

The format at Spill the Beanz tends to be an ‘anything goes.’ There’s no house band per se, essentially just Fradenburgh on bass and whoever shows up.

“Whatever you want to play, we’ll play,” he said. “It just can’t be too loud.”

And some people drive quite a ways to sit in with Fradenburg.

Dale O’Hara came from the other side of Belleville to jam.

“At most open mikes, you get two or three songs and then you sit down,” he said. “Here, I can do 10 if I want to.

“It’s a fairly long drive but it’s worth it.”

Depending on the entrance to NAEC you used for this year’s Cloyne Showcase Art & Craft Sale, you may have been greeted by a pastel (chalk-based) portrait of Keith Richards. A little further in the display, there was a similar treatment of Willie Nelson.

These are the work of Brian Bailey, a first-timer at the show game.

Bailey and his wife, Leane, retired to the Ompah area three years ago and are beginning to make an impression on the northern art scene.

They work in pastels and coloured pencils and in fact, have been commissioned to do a mural for North Frontenac Township (to be installed at the Public Works Garage on 509 and S. Lavant Road).

“We’ll be learning acyrlics for that one,” he said. “Pastels don’t stand up to the elements.”

Brian has drawn for years, dating back to the late ’70s but somewhere along the line, he fell out of it. He’s just picked it up again since retiring.

“I worked for Coca Cola for 40 years,” he said. “I went there in 1976 for a summer job and never left.”

Leane was a high school teacher in Durham. They lived in Port Perry but opted for Ompah in retirement.

“And yes,” he said. “I am a big Rolling Stones fan.”

“We have a wall in our basement that’s all Rolling Stones portraits,” she said.

“I did a bunch of them in 1978,” he said.

The Baileys’ work is on display in the gallery at the back of the Shamrock Bakery in Plevna.

And showing off the work of local artists is quite in keeping with why the Cloyne Showcase, now in its 47th year, began, said Katie Ohlke, NAEC art teacher and one of the organizers of the annual show.

“It started out as a way for the night school adult students to showcase what they’d done,” she said. “And now, 15 per cent of the sales help fund the art program at the school.”

And while many schools have art programs, not many get the support and emphasis NAEC gives its program.

“It’s great,” she said. “The kids here are very artsy.

“I think kids who grow up in the country here are more creative because they’re surrounded by nature.”

The first thing regular visitors to the Friends of Bon Echo Art Show and Sale probably noticed is that it’s in a new place. Instead of the gathering area where the show has been since Carla Miedema and a few others started it in 1996, this year it was moved to South Beach.

“There were a couple of reasons for the move, mostly logistics,” said FOBE President (and self-titled “chief cook and bottlewasher, jack of all trades, master of none”) Peter Alger. “With the boat tours, store and visitor centre, the old location was getting a little congested.

“So, in conjunction with Park staff, we thought we’d try it down here.

“Besides, there’s a nice breeze here coming off the lake.”

“Yes, the breeze is nice,” said FOBE executive director Chris Callan. “But we have a lot more room here, we have more parking and it’s close to real facilities.

“Also, it’s much more level ground and it gives us room for some kids activities like painting tree cookies.

“At 23 exhibitors, we’re down a little bit from previous years but I’m quite surprised at the turnout for a Friday,” said Alger. “Everybody seems happy and we hope this will be here for many years to come.

“And that looks good because we’re getting a lot more younger people volunteering.”

And the exhibitors seemed fine with the change, or at the very least were taking it in stride.

“I think I prefer the old location, there were more trees there for shade,” said long-time exhibitor Lisa Johnson. “But, there is a great view and every once in a while, there’s a nice breeze.

“But, I’ve made a few sales, so . . .”

“It’s pretty hot here and it’s a little out of the way but it’s the last day for the swim program so we’ve had lots of adults around with their kids,” said Miedema. “And, there’s a lot more room here.”

“I think it’s great,” said Debbie Reeve, who’s in her fourth year exhibiting at the show. “Sometimes, it’s kinda hard to teach old dogs new tricks.

“But here there’s lots of room, parking, a great view and a nice breeze.”

Toronto artist David Vasquez is returning to the show after a five or six year absence, so he barely remembers the old site.

“It’s a very nice place, I like it here,” he said. “I think it will be a great show, there’s lots of people looking.”

While he may not know every nut and bolt on every machine at Railway Heritage Park in Sharbot Lake, the newest addition to the train staff, ‘engineer’ Jonathon Wisteard comes as close as humanly possible.

“He’s done his homework,” said Central Frontenac Railway Heritage Society member Gary Giller. “He love the job, he loves to act and he’s filling an important role for us.”

“He’s very keen,” said Society member Sally Angle, who serves as host at the park on Saturdays. “He’s taught me what everything is for, even to the point where I was able to correct a mother when she tried to tell her kids that the brake wheel was used to steer the train.”

“I’m just a tour guide essentially, and I help clean up,” Wisteard said Saturday, taking a minute in between showing people around. “But I like to think of myself as the engineer.”

This is indeed a labour of love for Wisteard, who has model trains of his own and confesses to being a fan of all things train. But it’s also a job for him.

“Back in April or May, Janet Barr offered me the job through the committee,” he said.

“She managed to tap into some Community Living Employment Grants,” Angle said. “So we benefit as well.”

“We’ve got a green light so let’s wrap the sack to the next Hog,” Wisteard said.

He said his biological dad introduced him to model trains and he’s had the bug ever since. So, working on the Kick & Push Railway all the live long Saturday is something of a dream come true for him.

“I had to learn a lot but I’ve got it now,” he said. “I tell people what the railroad used to do back in the day and what all stuff is for but also the history.

“I like the fact that the railway shaped the country and made it strong and independent.

“They bring us the things we need and of course without trains, we’d still be stuck out in the middle of nowhere.”

When his gig with the Kick & Push is over at the end of the summer, Wisteard is looking forward to using some of his earnings to take a trip out west on The Canadian.

But for now, “I’m here for the summer and I’m happy to show people around.”

Stella Ter Hart has spent the last five years, with her husband, bringing a farm property with a heritage orchard back to production.

It has been a labour of love, with the emphasis on labour, at their property just north of Inverary on Loughborough Lake. Stella always finds time for music, however, and working on compositions is one of a number musical interests that has animated her life ever since she was child growing up in Estevan, Saskatchewan. Music, and music education eventually took her to Toronto. Her interests in music are broad and her studies at the Toronto Conservatory resulted in her receiving four diplomas, in performance, composition, pedagogy and theory. She later taught in New Brunswick, eventually returning to Ontario and living near Bobcaygeon.

“We were living in Bobcaygeon and when my husband was ready to retire we looked at this property on Loughborough Lake, and decided that, although it was run down, it had a lot of potential,” she said, in a interview last week.

The apple trees in the orchard all had a silver tinge in the bright sunshine when I paid her a visit, and she explained that they were covered with a clay based spray that keeps insects from the tender fruit, an organic pest control technique. The clay washes off before the fruit comes ripe, and if all goes to plan the harvest of heritage apples will be ready in time for the second annual Frontenac Open Farms event on September 8.

But on this day the subject was music, not apples.

“I enjoy entering composing competitions,” Stella, “they provide a focus for me, and a deadline, to complete something.”

She has been involved in music her whole life, both playing and composing, and a has gravitated towards composing choral works.

This spring, she entered the Lirit Women’s Chamber National New Music Composition competition. The contest involved composing music for a text called “The Last Note” by the Canadian poet Jill Solniki.

Stella spent quite a bit of time reading and re-reading the poem to get a clear picture about what it was about, and in her interpretation the poem was full of humour.It concerns the last note of a movement in classical piece, an orphan note seeking refuge as the audience sits in awkward silence during the interval before the start of the next movement.

“No one really knows what to do during that time. Do they clap, do they sit still, talk to their neighbour, and I saw the note bouncing around.”

Her interpretation led her to compose a light hearted setting for the poem, and it turned out the be a good interpretation because it won the contest. She received a cash prize and the “Last Note” will have its debut performance in the Spring of 2020.

“It is a thrill to win a prize, although I enjoy competitions even if I don’t win. There is excitement in reaching the long list, the short list, in coming close,” she said, alshe grants that winning is still the best outcome.

The Lirit Choir, sponsor of the Lirit Prize, is a Toronto based choir devoted to the exploration of the range of Jewish music. They perform throughout the year in community performances and at an annual major concert, which is where “The Last Note” will be performed.

No matter what needs to be done in the orchard when that concert comes about, Stella Ter Hart will be headed to Toronto to experience the performance.