Events
North Bay Centennial Events
Please join us this year as we celebrate North Bay’s Centennial with the opening of “North Bay at 100: A People’s History”. This page will be updated with upcoming events throughout the year.
Upcoming Events:
Folk/Roots Singer-Songwriters Will Gillespie and Brian Tremblay are teaming up and hitting the road on tour across Northern Ontario during Ontario Culture Days in October 2025 to perform new, original songs in old, familiar styles, telling stories from different unsung chapters in the history of Northern Ontario, from their respective concept Folk albums:
"MINE! True Stories and Legends of the Porcupine Gold Rush"
(Will Gillespie)
&
"In the Tracks of the Black Bear"
(Brian Tremblay)
Singer-Songwriter Will Gillespie performs his entire original Northern Ontario History-themed concept album song-cycle : "MINE! True Stories and Legends of the Porcupine Gold Rush" LIVE! Performing it as a kind of Campfire Cabaret, taking the audience on a musical journey back in time to a lost world of prospectors, pioneers, bootlegger-bandits, high-graders, mushers and moonshiners... written in several different historically-inspired, period-appropriate styles from Bluegrass to Ragtime to Concert Hall, Hot Jazz, Barrelhouse Blues, Waltzes and MORE!!
While he sings, projected backdrops of original Northern Ontario landscape paintings by visual Artist Susan Robinson and historical photos from the collection at the Timmins Museum National Exhibition Centre of the real people, places and events Will will be singing about play on a screen behind him.
Opening the show is Folk, Roots and Country Troubadour Brian Tremblay, performing songs from his own Northern Ontario history-inspired concept album: "In the Tracks of the Black Bear".
Brian's father worked for the Algoma Central Railway before and after the war. His uncles and cousins also worked for the railway. His siblings were born in Northern Ontario rail towns like Hawk Junction and Chapleau. Trains run in the Tremblay family blood. Tremblay has written new songs inspired by the ACR, combined with traditional railroad songs that so many will sing along with. In the Tracks of the Black Bear celebrates the Algoma Central Railway, the people who built it and the people who worked on it.
Special guest, local North Bay Singer-Songwriter Rose Erin Stokes, will play a local opener / "tweener" mini-set between Brian Tremblay's Algoma Central Railway / Sault Ste Marie Train songs and Will Gillespie's storytelling song cycle about the local Folk heroes behind the legends of the Porcupine Gold Rush. She has graciously agreed to fill-in for Lynn Eckroth at the performances in North Bay and Kirkland Lake.
Highlighted by an artistic acumen and an amazing ability to evoke emotion, Stokes' music is demonstrative of a songwriting craftsperson at work, with music, words, and vocal performances that connect to the hearts and spirits of all who hear them. What is undeniable is the deeply honest approach to her musical storytelling, a wide-open emotional tableau that is representative of the silence of the vast forests, and big open skies of the Northern Ontario city of North Bay where Stokes was born and raised. Stokes is a five-time Northern Ontario Music and Film Award nominee. Her Sophomore LP ‘When The Sun Goes Away’ earned her a nomination for Album of the Year at the Ontario Folk Music Awards.
This tour is made possible thanks to the support of the Ontario Arts Council
#ArtsAddValue
www.willgillespie.ca
www.briantmusic.com
www.roseerinstokes.com
https://www.willgillespie.ca/2-northern-troubadours
North Bay Art Association “Local Colour II: Centennial Edition” Opening
Enjoy FREE admission during the North Bay Farmers' Market on September 27th for the opening of Local Colour II: Centennial Edition.
The North Bay Art Association Presents "Local Colour II: Centennial Edition" at the North Bay Museum. This display of works by the talented artists of the North Bay Art Association was inspired by North Bay's Centennial as a City in 2025 with works connected to 100 years of local heritage.
This display will be open all fall in our upper events gallery (with limited availability on same dates when events are in progress).
To learn more about past and upcoming events, download our Summer 2025 Newsletter!