Seventeen of Canada’s best bands and solo artists are set to hit the amphitheatre stage over 21 nights this summer for the Jackson-Triggs Summer Concert Series..
As has been the case for many years running, the Sam Roberts Band will get it all started on July 7 with the first of two shows that weekend. 2023 marked the 20th anniversary of Roberts’ debut full-length We Were Born in a Flame, which contains perennial concert favourites and Brother Down and Where Have All the Good People Gone?
2024 will be the 21st year for Roberts and his band playing at the Jackson-Triggs Estate since the Concert Series’ inception in 2001.
“Performing at the Jackson-Triggs Amphitheatre is one of our band’s longest-running summer traditions,” says Sam Roberts said in a recent press release. “We keep coming back for that close connection we feel with the crowd. We’re excited to kick-off the series this year with two performances and keep the tradition going.”
He and his band of friends from his high school days in Montreal will be sure to play a few of the cosmic country songs from last year’s release The Adventures of Ben Blank, which the singer-songwriter recently told CBC’s Tom Power was inspired by Garth Brooks’ pseudonymously-credited The Life of Chris Gaines.
As much as Niagara feels like home for Roberts and his band after so many years playing the amphitheatre, the region once was an actual home for one of the acts playing two weeks later.
Originally from Antigonish, Nova Scotia, the Trews moved to Niagara Falls early in their career and recorded their 2003 debut album, House of Ill-Fame, while living in the Honeymoon City. They return to Jackson-Triggs June 22, one night after Matthew Good takes the stage.
Country music returns to Niagara-on-the-Lake with the Reklaws July 19 and 20 and Brett Kissel on August 22. Blue Rodeo’s Jim Cuddy brings his own band into town on August 23 while folk-rockers The Rural Alberta Advantage follow them the next evening.
July 5 and 6 will see back-to-back legends in David Wilcox and Bruce Cockburn while The Strumbellas and July Talk follow the next weekend.
Fresh off their Backroad Boogie tour, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan’s The Sheepdogs take over the amphitheatre for two nights to close out July. Take it from this reporter, who happened to catch them at their recent stop in Lindsay, Ontario, the band that won a 2011 contest to appear on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine is in fine, Allman Brothers-influenced form, with a new album set to hit streaming services any day now.
Things get a little quieter for August 9 and 10, with Chantal Kreviazuk, another J-T summer regular, and jazz crooner Matt Dusk respectively. Singer-songwriter Afie Jurvanen, better known as Bahamas, appears both Friday and Saturday the following weekend. Bahamas' brand new release Repackaged Love Songs, is a greatest hits album and perhaps a hint at what his setlist might look like that weekend.
Finally, a more recent tradition, a weekend residence on September 13 and 14 with Dwayne Gretzky, the super-group cover band based out of Toronto, returns. The ever-changing collective is known for getting the entire audience on their feet for their versions of anything from Pearl Jam to Abba, from Supertramp to Whitney Houston and everything in between.
“This is another exciting summer that pairs award-winning Canadian wine with homegrown musicians, for an exceptional concert-going experience that you can’t find anywhere else,” says Craig Swanson, Jackson-Triggs Niagara Estate Manager.
Great Estates Niagara Wine Club members have early access to purchase tickets, with the pre-sale beginning April 2. Tickets will go on sale to the general public on April 4, and will be sold through TIXR.com.
2024 Jackson-Triggs Summer Concert Series Lineup:
June 7 and 8: Sam Roberts Band
June 21: Matthew Good
June 22: The Trews
July 5: David Wilcox
July 6: Bruce Cockburn
July 12: The Strumbellas
July 13: July Talk
July 19 and 20: The Reklaws
July 26 and 27: The Sheepdogs
Aug 9: Chantal Kreviazuk
Aug 10: Matt Dusk
Aug 16 and 17: Bahamas
Aug 22: Brett Kissel
Aug 23: Jim Cuddy Band
Aug 24: The Rural Alberta Advantage
Sept 13 and 14: Dwayne Gretzky
