Big Dave McLean wins Blues Album of the Year at Junos

Winnipeg-based Big Dave McLean won Blues Album of the Year for This Old Life at the 2025 Juno Awards.

McLean has received many accolades for his musical contributions — in addition to being inducted into the Order of Canada in 2019.

“I would like to send out my deepest gratitude, respect, and admiration to all of the many people who have shared their incredible talents and have helped me present my interpretation of blues over the past 50 years or so,” says McLean.

For Manitoba Juno nominees, it’s more about where they’re from than where they’re headed

Eight Manitoba artist are vying for hardware at this year’s Juno Awards. Sebastian Gaskin and Liam Duncan reflect on their respective journeys to Canada’s biggest annual music award show.

When his latest album, Lovechild, was released in February, Gaskin’s name and likeness got the Yonge-Dundas Square treatment, beaming out from a digital billboard for all of downtown Toronto to see.

Scaling the side of the city’s Eaton Centre shopping mall, the Spotify endorsement was literally enormous. But for the 29-year-old singer, the recognition wasn’t nearly as impactful as a much smaller piece of outdoor advertising unveiled last summer on the road into Tataskweyak Cree Nation.

“I’ll never forget that day,” says Gaskin, who is nominated for Contemporary Indigenous Artist of the Year at Sunday’s Juno Awards in Vancouver.

Trump welcomes Kid Rock to White House for order targeting ticket scalpers

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump invited Kid Rock into the Oval Office on Monday and signed an executive order that he says will help curb ticket scalping and bring “commonsense” changes to the way live events are priced.

“Anyone who’s bought a concert ticket in the last decade, maybe 20 years — no matter what your politics are — knows that it’s a conundrum,” said Kid Rock, who wore a red bedazzled suit featuring an American flag motif and a straw fedora.

Designed to stop “price-gouging by middlemen,” the order directs Attorney General Pam Bondi and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to ensure that scalpers offering tickets at higher prices than their face value comply with all Internal Revenue Service rules.

It also orders the Federal Trade Commission to ensure “price transparency at all stages of the ticket-purchase process” and to “take enforcement action to prevent unfair, deceptive, and anti-competitive conduct in the secondary ticketing market,” which the Trump administration argues can restore sensibility and order to the ticket market.

What’s up: Georgia Toews book launch, Beach Boys, Felix, wearable art, puzzle derby

Toews returns for sophomore novel launchMcNally Robinson Booksellers, 1120 Grant Ave.Tonight, 7 p.m.FreeSpring book-launch season is heating up, and next to visit McNally Robinson Booksellers’ Grant Park location is Winnipeg-born, Toronto-based novelist and film/TV writer Georgia Toews, who launches her new novel, Nobody Asked For This, tonight at 7 p.m.

Toews’ latest is the followup to her 2023 debut novel, Hey, Good Luck Out There, which chronicled a woman’s time in a rehab facility and how she copes in the aftermath.

In Nobody Asked For This, readers follow Virginia, a 23-year-old comedian in Toronto navigating dysfunctional friendships, grief and relationships gone wrong.

Toews will read from her new novel, and will be joined in conversation by Free Press columnist Jen Zoratti before signing copies of the book.

A list of winners announced at the Juno Awards bash Sunday night

Here are the awards that were handed out Juno Awards broadcast on Sunday night:

Group of the year: The Beaches.

Country album of the year: "Complicated" by Josh Ross.

Breakthrough artist or group of the year: Nemahsis  

‘We are not for sale’: Michael Bublé sets patriotic tone at Junos as artists boast of Canadian pride

VANCOUVER - Michael Bublé handed Canadians a heartfelt dose of patriotism at the Juno Awards on Sunday, setting the tone for a night of not-so-subtle references to Canada's current tensions with the United States.

The Vancouver crooner jumped into his role as hometown Junos host by telling the crowd he was proud to be Canadian.

"We are the greatest nation on Earth," he said during his opening monologue. "And we are not for sale."

Other musicians leaned into Canadiana, most notably East Coast hero Anne Murray. 

The woman who killed Tejano music icon Selena in 1995 has been denied parole

HOUSTON (AP) — The woman convicted of killing Tejano music legend Selena Quintanilla-Pérez has been denied parole and will continue serving a life sentence for fatally shooting the rising young singer at a Texas motel in 1995, the state’s parole board announced Thursday.

Yolanda Saldívar, 64, was up for parole for the first time since the killing of the singer, known to fans as simply Selena.

One of the first Mexican American artists to break into the mainstream music scene, Selena shattered barriers for women in Latin music. She was 23 years old and on the verge of crossing over into English-language pop superstardom when she was killed.

The singer's family and Chris Pérez, her widower, expressed gratitude to the Texas Board of Pardon and Paroles.

Word on the beat: Junos mark a milestone with language diversity in album of the year

TORONTO - When Inuk singer Elisapie set out to record her pop covers album “Inuktitut,” she wasn’t planning to be a part of history at the Juno Awards.

Yet this weekend, the Montreal singer-songwriter will head to Vancouver to help mark a significant milestone for language representation.

For the first time in its 55-year history, the Junos have elevated projects featuring four different languages to one of its highest pedestals. In the album of the year category, this year's nominees are sung in English, French, Punjabi, and Inuktitut.

There are two albums by English-language nominees — country artist Joss Ross’ “Complicated” and Calgary pop star Tate McRae’s “Think Later” — as well as a francophone album by Quebec singer Roxane Bruneau titled “Submergé.” 

East Coast Music Association posts plan to address transparency concerns amid boycott

The East Coast Music Association has issued a six-point action plan to address demands for greater transparency and representation that have led some to boycott its marquee event.

Organizers of the East Coast Music Awards say they are committed to addressing their members' concerns after multiple musicians declined their nominations to protest the non-profit's direction.

That includes leading nominee Jeremy Dutcher, who said earlier this month he is among those skipping the awards gala May 8, part of a five-day conference in St. John's, N.L.

In a post to the ECMA website, organizers say they are “committed to moving forward together” with plans to involve three association members in the hiring process for the next CEO, as well as create a member advisory group to the board for strategic planning.

30 years after music icon Selena’s murder, Yolanda Saldívar is up for parole. Here’s what to know

Thirty years ago, music legend Selena Quintanilla-Pérez was killed by her fan club’s president, Yolanda Saldívar. For the last three decades, Saldívar has served her life sentence in Texas.

Now 64, Saldívar has a petition for parole under review, according to Texas Department of Criminal Justice online records. On Sunday, she is up for parole for the very first time.

According to a spokeswoman for the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, her case will be voted on or around then, but there's no exact date for the decision to be released.

Here's everything you need to know about Selena, Saldívar and the parole process in Texas:

Music Review: Jessie Reyez returns in triumph with ‘Paid in Memories’

Most artists would make the first song on their new album something welcoming, trendy or pleasing, at least to make the Spotify algorithm happy. Not Jessie Reyez.

She crafted a song with clear red flags — “I Never Said I Was Sane” — a totally bananas opening cut that includes screaming, taunting, religious texts, whispering, heavy distortion, a little flute and a babyish pout. “Lost some screws along the way to L.A.,” she sings.

That's why Reyez is always a glorious sonic handful and why the album “Paid in Memories” is another of her messy triumphs. Think of her as the anti-Tate McRae.

The Toronto-bred musician is a magpie of an artist, taking a little from hip-hop here, dipping into some alt-rock on another, using a cool soul lick or a Latin beat. If you know where the next song is taking you, you're lying. She can go from purring along to a plunky guitar to feet-planted battle rapping, even in the same song.

Shania Twain to serve as parade marshal, perform at Calgary Stampede

CALGARY - Man! She feels like a parade marshal.

Country music superstar Shania Twain was announced Wednesday as the parade marshal at the Calgary Stampede this year.

The "Man! I Feel Like A Woman" singer will lead the parade through the streets of downtown Calgary on July 4 and perform at the Scotiabank Saddledome the next day. The Stampede runs from July 4 to 13.

"The Calgary Stampede is known around the world as the Greatest Outdoor Show on Earth. I am so thrilled to announce that I've been selected to lead the parade as the 2025 Calgary Stampede parade marshal," Twain said in a video message.

Music Review: Mumford & Sons return after seven years with a folksy, existential album, ‘Rushmere’

In the 2010s, Mumford & Sons' stomp-clap rock ruled. The English band had not just ushered in a new wave of bluegrass Americana revivalism, they'd created a movement. Then life happened: the COVID-19 pandemic caused delays, banjoist and lead guitarist Winston Marshall left the band and frontman Marcus Mumford released a solo album. Now a trio, Mumford & Sons are back with their fifth studio album and first in nearly seven years, “Rushmere.”

It’s a familiar-feeling record — of course there are banjos — with instantly recognizable folk instrumentation reinforced by swelling vocals. In that way, it detours slightly from their last offering, 2018's “Delta,” with its electronic interludes. Instead, “Rushmere” directly embraces the band's folk heritage.

To create “Rushmere,” Mumford & Sons enlisted producer Dave Cobb and recorded in Nashville, Tennessee; Savannah, Georgia; and at Mumford's U.K. studio in Devon. It's both a return-to-home and an exercise in ambition. Opener “Malibu” begins with muted percussion and acoustic guitar strums, raising the question: Is this going to be a quiet, introspective record?

Marcus Mumford’s voice comes in, then piano, then the stacked vocal harmonies, then the banjo. The song’s texture gets richer and richer, and the question answers itself. This is the foot-tapping M&S that originally fueled the band’s popularity, from their 2009 debut “Sigh No More” to the years that followed.

Going for baroque at eclectic three-week fest

“He was a madman,” says oboist Caitlin Broms-Jacobs about 17th-century composer Jean-Baptiste Lully.

“They used to conduct with these huge walking sticks, which they pounded on the floor, but he got really angry and accidentally pounded it into his foot. And then he died from gangrene. It seems to be the only thing that people know about him. It’s almost like nobody’s even heard his music, right?”

Well, Winnipeggers will soon have a chance to hear the exceptional Lully — a pioneering madman in the worlds of French opera and courtly dance — during the Winnipeg Baroque Festival, which begins tomorrow and runs until April 19.

Broms-Jacobs’ Fierbois duo (which also includes pianist Madeline Hildebrand) performs Lully and others with guests flutist Jan Kocman and Kathryn Brooks at Love and Madness on April 17 at the Canadian Mennonite University’s Laudamus Auditorium.