Input wanted to help celebrate the Kiwanis Festival of Performing Arts centenary

Share memories about the Kiwanis Festival of Performing Arts celebrating the centenary in 2027.

The Kiwanis Festival of Performing Arts (KFPA) has been hard at work planning for next year’s 100th anniversary of the festival. Since 1927, the festival has provided a safe place for non-professionals to come together and perform before adjudicators and an audience. For many, the opportunity with KFPA was often the only time participants get to perform before an audience.

In the beginning the adjudicators were from England. One such man was world famous musician and educator Norman Wilks who adjudicated in 1930, 1935 and 1936. His contribution to the festival was so significant that he donated the Norman Wilks challenge trophy. It was first awarded in 1936 for a piano soloist playing Beethoven and is still to this day awarded to the pianist with the best piano solo of a Canadian composer.

Now that this very important anniversary is approaching, thoughts are with what to do to celebrate this auspicious occasion. This is where the public comes in.

Have you participated in KFPA as an aspiring musician, singer or dancer? Have you been an adjudicator giving feedback to participants? Were you in the audience and have a particular memory to share? Pat McKinna, executive director of KFPA wants to hear from you.

“Even at the beginning, this music festival has drawn participants from as far away as Hamilton and even Peterborough. So, we are calling out on all alumni for their input wherever they may be but, especially within the London-KW-Goderich triangle,” said McKinna.

A social media campaign has begun and each month from June to April 2027 will celebrate a decade at a time with pictures and memories that correspond. June was the beginning years and July celebrates the music of wartime years. It is important to note that during the war years the festival persevered unlike others at the time.

As a community festival, the celebration of the centenary will be a community collaboration using suggestions from the public to assist in curating something that incorporates what the festival has meant in the past, present and future.

“This festival has always emphasized offering a constructive opportunity for non-professional performers, especially beginners, more than competitive success. This earned it the reputation as ‘the friendly festival’. The collegiality that fosters made it the go-to or must-attend event for many years, and kept it going even through (the Second World War) when many other festivals paused operation or closed, much like the pandemic. Canadian music legend Sir Ernest MacMillan, one of the first adjudicators at this festival, noted that ‘Art matters – especially in hard times.’ KFPA was one of the few festivals who pivoted to offer a digital version of the traditional live format during the pandemic, which probably makes it the longest-running festival in Ontario as most festivals of a similar age have had interruptions in their history,” shared McKinna.

The public can contribute in the short term by going onto the website kiwanisfestivalstratford.com/about and clicking on the button “Click here to let us know” to add your own memories of the festival and what it has meant. It is intended for anyone that had anything to do with the festival, as a participant, an accompanist, an adjudicator, a volunteer, a donor or in other ways.

The benefit concert scheduled for April 2, 2027 will incorporate potential suggestions from the public. Would you like to perform again? Have you pictures to share? Memorabilia from past performances? All helps to paint a picture of how KFPA fed into the fabric of the arts and culture scene for three weeks every April over 100 years.

“The benefit concert could pay tribute to each decade with the choice of music from that era. There are many families that participated in the festival so perhaps we could reunite some of them to perform. We could re-enact popular entries from the past, like a kazoo orchestra. We could commission a song and invite a school choir to perform it. So many thoughts,” said McKinna.

There will also be a special edition of the Stratford Times celebrating the centenary to be published the same day as the benefit concert. This will include pictures, stories and interviews with past participants. Contributions from the public will make this a fulsome keepsake highlighting the past, present and what the future of KFPA could bring.

Be a part of this invitation to contribute in a personal way to the KFPA centenary and look forward to next year’s celebration by the community, for the community. Visit kiwanisfestivalstratford.com/about to share.