Come Join Us for St. John's Patronal Festival Weekend
Celebrating 100 Years on Humberside!
Patronal Festival Sunday Service
Special Guest Musician Ken Whiteley, renowned Canadian gospel and folk musician
Sunday, May 7, 10 am
Let's celebrate our Patron Saint John the Evangelist and the 100th anniversary of the laying of the cornerstone of our Humberside home with a good friend of St. John's, Ken Whiteley.
Ken Whiteley has been playing folk, blues, gospel and other roots traditions for well over fifty years and greatly values the time he spent making music at St. John’s West Toronto Anglican Church. He has received many awards including a Canadian Folk Music Award, 7 Juno nominations, 18 Maple Blues nominations, a Genie Award (for Best Song in a Canadian Film) and Lifetime Achievement Awards from the Mariposa Folk Festival, The Maple Blues Awards and Folk Music Ontario but ultimately his music is all about making connection. He loves to get people singing with him whether he’s on a concert stage, a folk festival or a church service.
Ken has made over 32 albums and his most recent one, “Long Time Travelling” was just nominated for a Canadian Folk Music Award as Best Traditional Album this year. He has written over 400 songs including one that became a staple of his visits to St. John West Toronto, “Let My Life Be Prayer”.
Ken is a living link to the traditions of people he has sung and played with including Pete Seeger, The Georgia Sea Island Singers, Tom Paxton, John Hammond Jr., Blind John Davis and many others. He brings this vast experience to each performance as a way to allow all of us to experience coming together through the power of song.
To learn more about Ken and his music, check out his website: www.kenwhiteley.com.
Ken joins our regular musicians Dan Gooch, Lee Ramsay, and Alie Rutty and our talented ministerial team.