Royal Wood and Jeffrey Straker (Submitted Photo/Cristina Fernandez)

By Derek Craddock

IN THE MOOD FOR A MELODY

‘Play us a song’: Piano Men tour comes to P.A.

Mar 24, 2024 | 1:00 PM

By nine o’clock on Sunday night, you might be singing a song with your real estate novelist and friend from the navy after hearing from the piano men.

On Saturday night at the EA Rawlinson Centre, singer-songwriters Royal Wood and Jeffrey Straker will come together for their Piano Men tour.

Both musicians spoke to paNOW in preparation for the big show and said the idea was brought to them after many theatres in Western Canada were interested in booking them.

“Some of them got talking behind the scenes and they said ‘What would it take? How could we get these two guys together in the same room, on the same night to do a show, sing their own songs but bring them together on one stage,” said Straker.

“When Jeff and I were talking, obviously him being such a fluent and talented piano player and songwriter and singer, it made sense, obviously,” added Wood. “(We’re) also very big fans of the Billy Joel Song, Piano Man. It all just kind of made sense and it was just something that was catchy as well.”

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The pair have known each other for many years and have co-written some songs together.

Both have played in Prince Albert before with Straker noting he was supposed to play in a show in the city in 2020. However, the COVID-19 pandemic and government health restrictions meant the show couldn’t happen in front of a large crowd. The concert, though, went ahead and was the first streamed show for the Rawlinson Centre.

“I think they had 30 people in the room and then all these people logging on…they had so many people trying to log in at the end of the show that the system couldn’t handle it so we had all sorts of glitches,” he said.

Straker also did some backyard shows in P.A. during the pandemic but one show in particular is his most memorable.

“It was called the Secret Spaces Tour, and the idea was doing performances in unusual, not typically used for a performance space and the Prince Albert stop was in a big old home called the Keyhole Castle and in the attic of the Keyhole Castle, which was a very grand home from the turn of the century, there’s a ballroom, and in that ballroom in the Keyhole Castle, believe it or not, there was a concert grand piano.”

For Wood, he also performed in Prince Albert several times and adds any show in Saskatchewan is special for him.

“I fell in love with Saskatchewan long before I met my wife,” he said. “I just think it’s such a beautiful part of the country and obviously the sunrise and sunset is pretty spectacular and as well as just the people and I always felt like home before it was home.”

As for the show itself, Straker and Wood are excited about the music they’ll perform and the journey they hope to take audiences on.

“We definitely have a story to tell before or after a song and certainly guide it that way. (It’s) a night for an audience member to not just tap their foot and sing along, but to one where they’ll actually be taken emotionally on a journey and on a story,” said Wood.

Tickets are still available for the Piano Men Tour and the show gets underway at 7:30 p.m.

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derek.craddock@pattisonmedia.com