The kitchen party – a lively gathering of friends and neighbours that includes eating, drinking, socializing and music that ends up around the fridge –is a tradition familiar to those in the Maritimes, but is less common on the West Coast.
A Squamish musician and dancer aims to change that.
Fiddler, step dancer and singer Jocelyn Pettit is organizing a West Coast Kitchen Party on Saturday (Sept. 30) in downtown Squamish.
The free event is focused on the kitchen party idea of people gathering together for fun live music and food, and having a great time, Pettit told The chief.
“It’s going to be a real blast,” she said.
Attendees can expect food, a craft market, silent auction, performances and a traditional music session as well as guitar, fiddle, song and step dance workshops.
Pettit will be leading the fiddle and step dance workshops and local singer Rita Kyle will lead a “Sea Shanty” workshop.
“Which is a singing workshop focusing on songs of the sea,” explained Pettit.
The performance showcase will feature artists from Squamish, Vancouver, and beyond.
The finale, a traditional music session “will be a very social gathering where people meet and play tunes together and have a good time,” said Pettit.
“It is meant to be a really fun, social event involving as many people as possible.”
The Squamish kitchen party is part of the annual national Culture Days that run from Sept. 29 to Oct. 1 when hundreds of thousands of artists and cultural organizations in 900 cities from coast to coast host events.
Culture Days began in September of 2010 as a way to engage more Canadians in the arts and culture of their communities, according to a news release about the Squamish event.
Pettitt has been named one of six 2017 BC Culture Days Ambassadors, by the not-for-profit, volunteer Culture Days organization.
Squamish’s family-friendly West Coast Kitchen Party will start at 3 p.m. and run until 9 p.m. in the new Centrepoint facility at 38024 Fourth Ave.
Workshops are first up at 3 p.m. And the performances begin at 6:30 p.m.
For more information, email info@jocelynpettit.
