‘Interesting mix’ promised at virtual SCMAS
Wes Labrash plans to spend Saturday night at home near Lumsden with his TV on.
He’ll be watching the Saskatchewan Country Music Association Awards, something he usually sees live and in-person as the SCMA president.
The awards ceremony was supposed to take place April 18 in Regina, but then COVID-19 happened. So Labrash and his team made it into a livestreamed event.
They considered three options after the live show was kiboshed.
One, was to postpone to the fall for a live full-weekend event, as initially planned — but there was too much uncertainty about whether COVID-19 restrictions would allow for an event like this even months down the road.
Two, was to mail out the awards to winners, with no elaborate celebration. “That felt like a cop-out,” said Labrash, to not honour or profile the nominees in the way they deserve.
Three, was the virtual show that’s been put together. Four producers spearheaded the project: Graham Condo, Paul Lomheim, Heidi Munro and Hal Schrenk were each responsible for finding the content for the 135-minute show.
“When you’re putting on a show and you have 18 performers and they’ve got to pre-submit their performances and have that worked into the show, you’ve got to go and collect it all. And you’ve got to set up production times, recording times, for virtual recording booths. Some people did their performance at their kitchen table; others sent in a professionally produced video,” said Labrash.
“I haven’t seen the show yet, but I’m told it’s a real interesting mix of performances of all types.”
He hasn’t seen it due to a conflict of interest: His son, Justin Labrash, is nominated for several awards, including fan’s choice entertainer of the year and male artist of the year. They’ll be watching the show together, with Wes Labrash on “pins and needles.” Justin may be less surprised.
There wasn’t time to get every nominee to record a just-in-case acceptance speech, so only the winners were contacted to pre-record an acceptance speech.
“The artists who won know they won,” said Wes Labrash. “They’ve been sworn to secrecy.”
Doing a livestreamed show means televising way more awards than usual. “We give out 32 awards every year, but we only ever televise less than half of them,” said Labrash. Due to timing constraints, industry awards don’t usually get as much publicity. “Now we were able to get all 32 on TV, which that’s never happened in the time I’ve been involved in the SCMA.”
The show will feature 18 performances by Donny Parenteau, Chris Henderson, Brody Siebert, Samara Yung, Shantaia, Tommy John Ehman, The North Sound, Amy Nelson, Jordyn Pollard, Erin Hill, Yvonne St. Germaine, Tayler
Tluchak, Amanda Hagel, Aces Wyld, Jay & Jo, Stephanie Rose, Brock Andrews, and Munro & Patrick. Radio personalities Matt Ryan and Cody Glydon are hosts.
Watch the SCMAS on Saturday, May 16, via livestream (at myaccess.ca/access7/live/scma and scma.sk.ca) and on Access
Communications channel 7. It’s airing in real time, so tune in at 8 p.m. sharp. Once the show is over, there’s no rewatching, unless you purchase a DVD through Access.
A digital program guide and more information are available at scma.sk.ca.