Anne Leroux Bartl has had a song in her heart ever since she was
a little girl.
Who: Anne Leroux Bartl, mid-50s, Ottawa
What: Solo song performance, "From a Distance"
Why: A lifelong passion for song and music - she performed as a child professionally with her family - manifested in a roof-raising performa
Andrew Stawicki
"I love how I feel when I'm singing," Bartl says
with a smile.
She grew up touring the Ottawa Valley with her parents and three
sisters as part of the McCrae Family Singers, performing at wedding
receptions, funerals, high school graduations and charity functions.
While she would go on to pursue working with children, singing
and music were never far from her thoughts.
Today, in her mid-50s, she works as a recreation co-ordinator for
special needs kids, and never dreamed she'd be singing her
heart out on the mother of all stages, Roy Thomson Hall.
Bartl was one of 1,300 participants at this year's RBC Seniors'
Jubilee Concert, which took place Aug. 18 to 23, 2003. Celebrating
its 15th anniversary, the talent extravaganza featured singing,
dancing, comedy, magic, cabaret and instrumental acts by performers
from across the province and beyond.
"It's extremely exciting," Bartl says. "This
is the ultimate dream come true for me."
In an age where youth and beauty dominate the screen and stage,
Jubilee organizers Wayne Burnett and partner Glenda Richardson want
to highlight the talents of a demographic often overlooked by society.
"We felt a need to address the fact that older performers were
not being showcased in major venues," says Burnett, who has
worked in professional theatre for 30 years. "It seems the
work is geared to under-30s. We devised this show, and it hit a
nerve."
What began in 1989 as a two-day event with about 350 performers
has evolved into the largest senior variety showcase in North America,
featuring five shows that play to a 12,000-strong audience.
In 1994, Burnett and Richardson founded the Canadian Organization
of Senior Artists and Performers (COSAP), a non-profit organization
that gives seniors across Ontario a chance to pursue their performance
talents and entertain audiences.
Aside from the Jubilee, Burnett and Richardson spend much of the
year travelling to residential homes, retirement villages and community
centres across the province, training seniors in the performing
arts, and helping them put together shows, called Jubilations, for
the local community.
Who: Donald Holmes, 56, Toronto
What: Celtic Rock, by the Thornhill Scottish Country Dancers
Why: By the time the Jubilee rolled around, Donald and his 11 co-performers had practised every week for several months. It's an oppor
Andrew Stawicki
"We all want to look young and beautiful and sexy, but seniors
have so much talent and so much to offer," Burnett says. "The
response is gratifying because it's about them opening up to
a new experience. They are hugely appreciative."
That includes comedian Jim Bibby, a 10-year Jubilee veteran and
a crowd favourite. "I love entertaining seniors," says
the 83-year-old resident of Oakville, Ontario. "I get so much
pleasure from seeing and hearing people laugh. They're laughing
outwardly and I'm laughing on the inside." It wasn't
always that way.
Captured during the Second World War in North Africa in 1942, Bibby
eventually ended up with 200 other men in a work camp in Germany
for 18 months. Lodged in a defunct dancehall, the prisoners devised
variety shows to help them endure the harsh conditions and loneliness.
"We would try to dress up in evening suits, but we had no
white shirts, so one guy made us fronts out of cardboard,"
Bibby says. "It kept us going." After the war, he pursued
work as a mental health nurse, but continued performing comedy at
weddings, piano bars and nightclubs.
For the last 18 years, the now-retired Bibby has been spending
his summers in Florida, entertaining seniors with his arsenal of
about 400 well-honed jokes.
"People think of seniors as like the ones on TV, who are less
capable," he says, "but it's amazing what people
our age can do when they have the chance."
For Elizabeth Patterson, that chance means sharing the passion that
has been the basis of her life's work.
"I love dancing, and at the Roy Thomson, you get such an appreciative
audience," says the retired ballet teacher, who performed in
three different acts at the 2003 Jubilee.
On the doorstep of 70, Patterson taught ballet for 38 years at
her own school, the Oakville School of Dancing, and also worked
as an examiner - a role that took her globetrotting to places
such as Brazil, New Zealand, Malta, England and across Canada and
the United States.
Who: Veronica and Walter Sliva, 50s, Whitby
What: Grace the Floor (group of six)
Why: She is a freelance writer, he works as a claims manager for a reinsurance company, and when they met on a dance floor 11 years ago, it was a
Andrew Stawicki
She retired 10 years ago and eventually moved to Village by the
Arboretum, a Guelph, Ontario retirement community. But her first
love has never been far off the radar screen.
A new interest in tap dancing led to lessons at the Oakville Senior
Citizens' Recreation Centre, and before long she joined the
Happy Tappers, a 19-member group that performed twice at the Jubilee.
She also began teaching tap at the Evergreen Seniors Centre in
Guelph, and formed the Evergreen Footlights, a dance troupe that
performed its own colourful routine at the show.
But Paterson's biggest thrill came from her newest act -
Two's Company, a contemporary dance piece she developed with
a partner.
"It's light rock with a classical feel to it," says
Patterson, who marked five years with the Jubilee this year. "You
definitely know you've danced when you're done!"
Participating in the Jubilee year after year allows Patterson a
chance to reconnect with old friends and to sustain her long-time
love affair with dance. "I feel better when I dance. If I have
a day where I'm not dancing, I can't say that I feel as
good," she says. "It keeps you in a good frame of mind
and it keeps you healthy."
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