The Kettle Valley Brakemen have been performing in campgrounds and Concert Halls from The Coast to The Kootenays for the past 25 years and we’re still going strong!  What makes The Brakemen unique is our blend of stories and songs around an interesting theme, specifically Western Canada’s steam rail era.  For every generation, trains seem to have a magical appeal.

GETTING STARTED

Even before the opening of the Kettle Valley Steam Railway in Summerland, the KVR rail bed was a popular cycling attraction in our valley.  The arrival of the tourist train increased traffic and interest in local railway history.  As a way to tell that heroic mountain Railway story The Kettle Valley Brakemen was formed.  Our first public appearance was at the official opening of the Summerland Steam Train.  The Summerland Review featured a page one story about that official opening beneath a picture of The Brakemen performing. So right from our beginning The Brakemen were officially part of Kettle Valley Railway history.  Our concerts aim to provide audiences with a musical train ride back into railway history.

OUR MATERIAL

Brakeman Jack researches Canadian Railway history, discover stories that have appeal for people today and turns them (or part of them) into songs; mostly with a folk/bluegrass feel.  Jack collected KVR stories from some of the “KV Boys” who fired steam and were alive when he began the Brakemen project.  He also immersed himself in KV written history and today, count many KVR chroniclers as friends.  After all, Brakemen performances are free advertising for their books.  Sometimes authors and trainmen were one and the same.  Jack got several wonderful stories from Alan Palm’s “Lions in the Coquihalla” and would occasionally phone Alan about getting the right wording while songwriting.  Authenticity matters.

BRAKEMEN LONGEVITY and DIVERSITY OF MATERIAL

While every KV Brakemen concert opens with the band’s “Climb Board!” theme song and always ends with a couple of audience sing along numbers the rest of the program gets changed from show to show depending on audience and venue.  Performing in Merritt, The Brakemen always include their song about J.J. Gillis the official KVR doctor who’d lived there.  In fact at one Merritt performance Brakeman Jack asked the crowd “How many of you were brought into the world by J.J. Gillis?”  More than half the hands in the room went up!  That was a friendly crowd!  Similarly when performing at the Midway Museum, The Brakemen always sing of 1905’s “Donnybrook in Midway”.  Concert goers never know exactly what they’re going to hear and that keeps things interesting for them...and for the band as musicians.  For example, in 2015 the 100th anniversary of the KVR, every story/song combo in that year’s performances concerned life on the Kettle Valley Line while by 2017 when Canadians celebrated our 150th birthday, The KV Brakemen included songs with more general historical interest.  Including a fascinating railway tale about Sir John A’s  wife Lady Agnes MacDonald.  The Brakemen try to humanize history through their story/song mix.  It works.  In business terms, for the past 25 years there’s ALWAYS been a willing market for Brakemen concerts.  Since the taming of fire throughout the dark ages and beyond humans have entertained each other with stories and songs.  The Kettle Valley Brakemen are proud to be part of this troubadour tradition.

THE UNIQUE APPEAL OF BRAKEMEN SONGS

Audiences love being surprised, amused, and informed while being ENTERTAINED.  Being entertaining is job one.  All KV Brakemen original songs have a Railway theme but extend well beyond the usual tales of brave engineers and terrible train wrecks.  We—tastefully—explore construction camp prostitution, ghost train sightings, raining rattlesnakes, feminism and even constipation!  Pick your poison!

Humour engages listeners and is often present in Brakemen stories and songs.  What makes Heritage entertaining special is that the band’s story/songs try to INFORM as it entertains.  The audience gets “hooked” with the story then learns a little history through the song.  Brakeman Jack says, “Our goal is for folks to exit a Brakemen performance being happily entertained BUT knowing more about life in the steam rail era than they did when the show began.”

ANECDOTES OVER THE YEARS provided by Brakeman Jack

1. Our audition.  In the winter before the opening of the KVR in Summerland I approached KVR management with the Brakemen idea.  They loved it!   I received an offer and a challenge...if I found interesting stories and created songs with audience appeal...The Kettle Valley Brakemen would be given a ten appearance contract to perform on specific dates at the West Summerland station once the line officially opened.  This was...IF WE PASSED THE AUDITION.  This audition was to take place at the KV Restoration Society’s spring meeting just before the Railway was set to open.  Finding musicians and song material was a wonderful creative experience but I knew that for the performances to REALLY work-as story teller-I had to project an “air of knowledge” about steam trains.  However, previously I had been a high school history teacher.  I’d never sat in an engine cab in fact this audition was the first time I’d ever worn overalls!  With a contract for a season of performances on the line I was feeling the pressure.  Just before we went on I was told there were FOUR retired KV steam engineers sitting in the front row judging us.  That didn’t help my ability to focus!  Fortunately, they loved our songs celebrating their own contribution to  Okanagan railway Heritage.  The Brakemen later were invited to perform for these old KV Boys at their annual summer barbecue reunion-and poker game-in Brookmere.  But that’s another story...

2. “Hey kids, let’s put on a show!  BRAKEMEN MUSICAL THEATRE 

  In 2003 the Brakemen play “Kettle Valley Memories” was staged with multiple performances in both Penticton and Peachland.  Actors brought each of our historical stories to life then lights would come up on the band for the appropriate song.  We included lyrics to some of the song choruses in the programme so each performance evolved into a giant sing along.  We Brakemen had support from two Penticton theatrical companies and (in true community theatre spirit) once we all realized we were producing something ORIGINAL, a lot of positive energy was generated.  Alana Mathews wrote a wonderful review of Kettle Valley Memories that (alas) the local newspaper didn’t publish. No, it wasn’t Shakespeare but everyone involved had great fun...plus we played to full houses and sold lots of CDs!

3. The Myra Canyon Trestle Re-opening 2008.  The Kettle Valley Brakemen shared in Kelowna’s misfortune when a wall of fire destroyed the Myra Canyon Trestles—along with 239 Kelowna homes—in 2003.  Our regular “concerts for cyclists” business went up in smoke.  The Brakemen memorialized Kelowna’s tragedy in “Okanagan Firestorm” a song that we recorded and placed on our web site as a free download right next to the address for donations to the Trestle Restoration Society.  We included “Okanagan Firestorm” as an encore number for Kelowna audiences for the next couple of years.  The song was played as backdrop in a news feature on CHBC at the time. People did download it and I know people did donate.  I don’t know whether this affected Ken Campbell’s thinking when his Myra Canyon Restoration Society asked us to perform before a large audience (including the national press) at the Official Re-opening of the Myra Trestles in 2008.  One of our songs concerns the challenges Myra Canyon presented for steam trains.  To be singing “Myra’s Majesty” beside the rail bed looking down on that trail of trestles hanging on the Myra Canyon walls at that official Re-opening was a tremendous personal thrill.  And, once again The Brakemen were taking part in KVR history!

WHO HIRES US?

Museums, Heritage attractions, regional summer Music in the Park programs and Seniors Societies throughout the Okanagan keep The Brakemen busy.  Naturally for a Heritage Act like The Kettle Valley Brakemen, Canada Day gets booked up early.  For many years we performed July 1st concerts shuttling between two Okanagan communities on the same day!  The appeal of Brakemen concerts for museum curators is that The Brakemen bring Locals in the door—even if only to buy concert tickets.  However we HAVE performed intimate concerts INSIDE museums all across southern B.C including multiple years with shows in Midway, Osoyoos, Penticton and Revelstoke.  The Peachland Museum which is tiny hosted several of our concerts in Heritage Park on the beach.

As for appropriate Heritage sites, we’ve played a lot of them from Fort Steele in Cranbrook to the B.C. Railway Heritage Museum in Squamish including in our Okanagan: The O’Keefe Ranch, the Grist Mill and (of course) The Kettle Valley Steam Train in Summerland.

By far the fastest growing demand for Brakemen concerts comes from Seniors Societies in communities throughout B.C.’s southern interior.  Many of these organizations have an available concert space and often a good sound system.  Seniors, with their OWN memories of the steam train era, are a very receptive audience for Brakemen stories and songs.

Who Are The Kettle Valley Brakemen?

Train Thang!

The Kettle Valley Railway, engineering marvel of Andrew McCulloch stretched through southern British Columbia, Canada from Midway through the trestles and tunnels of rugged Myra Canyon.

Winding down the mountains, its trains rolled along the hills above Naramata in the Okanagan Valley and on to Penticton before climbing again, through Summerland across the Trout Creek trestle and on to Princeton, Coalmont, Coquihalla, and down into Hope.

THE SEEN 28

"KETTLE VALLEY MEMORIES"

A heritage musical containing 14 Kettle Valley Brakemen songs that uses skits, mime and dance to tell the dramatic story of the Kettle Valley Railway. This humorous play for the whole family enjoyed hit runs in Penticton and Peachland during the spring of 2003. Like a Brakemen performance, Kettle Valley Memories is a fast paced blend of fascinating historical insights and toe tapping music. The play's program contains the lyrics to the choruses of many of the songs and the audience is urged to sing along.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY: 

"History comes alive in this time-warp tour of local heritage"
- Dorothy Brotherton, The West Side Weekly

"Kettle Valley Memories was a great success. It presented a smoothly flowing scrapbook of the railway's past. By the end of the show everyone was singing and clapping to the music."
-Alanna Mathew, Penticton Herald