On Saturday night, Don Amero is in town at R.D. Parker Collegiate's Letkemann Theatre for the second show of the season for Thompson Concert Series 2010-11.
Amero, from Winnipeg, won for male artist of the year at the 2009 Aboriginal Peoples Choice Music Awards for his CD "Deepening."
Tickets are $25 plus tax.
On Monday, Dec. 13, the second annual edition of an Old Fashioned Christmas Concert will also take place at the Letkemann Theatre at 7 p.m. Tickets are $5. The Thompson Community Band will be among the featured performers. Donna Dyke Wilson, one of the organizers of the event, has also been looking for a "dancing monkey" to perform at the concert.
Almost 500 people turned out last year for the inaugural event in -35 C temperatures. The concert is a fundraiser for A Port in the Storm, a housing initiative in the fundraising stage still, but intended to be built for the exclusive benefit of people living in Northern and rural Manitoba, who have to stay in Winnipeg for an extended length of time for medical reasons.
The Winnipeg-based A Port in the Storm, as of October, had raised $2.066 million - less than a third of its $6.4 million fundraising goal - in 4 1/2 years since March 2006.
The project is intended to provide a safe and supportive environment, close to major Winnipeg hospitals, with home-like amenities, leisure activities for the family, places for quiet reflection, socializing and dining with other guests.
Rural and Northern Manitobans spend over 160,000 patient days in Winnipeg per year it is estimated by the organization, with more than 15,000 patients coming from the Burntwood Regional Health Authority (BRHA).
The A Port in the Storm project started when Joanne Loughery, who teaches oncology nursing at Red River College, and Pat Benjaminson, also an oncology nurse, along with Greg Pilgrim, a patient volunteer, decided to honour the dying wish of cancer victim Sue Leslie.
Loughery is president of the organization and Benjaminson is the vice-president.
Leslie was a single mother living in rural Manitoba who had struggled with the financial and emotional burdens of staying in Winnipeg for treatment and mothering her son. She vowed she would help build an affordable home-like environment for people like her.
Also on Dec. 4, the Salvation Army will hold their Christmas concert at 7 p.m. Saturday night in their citadel at 305 Thompson Drive N. All are welcome to attend.
Majors Ron and Linda Mailman moved to Thompson in July, taking over the Thompson Corps of the Salvation Army from Majors Grayling and Jacqueline Crites, who left for Winnipeg on medical leave.
