Airline passengers were lucky to be stuck on the tarmac last week when 7 members of a folk band erupted with a lively impromptu 4-song set aboard the packed Air Canada flight.
The Toronto-based Lemon Bucket Orkestra, which plays traditional jigs and energetic Eastern European folk music, was setting off for Romania to play a festival in Bucarest.
Half of the fourteen-piece “party band” pulled out their brass horn, fiddle, accordion and fife to play for the passengers who clapped and danced. (Watch the video below)
The band grew out of a relationship between a Breton accordionist with Celtic folk background and a Ukrainian fiddler. They soon discovered that others, too, were craving the energy of traditional Eastern European music in the streets and clubs of Toronto. In a few short months, the original quartet swelled into a fourteen-piece band which is gaining a reputation as the city’s liveliest party band. Their explosive take on Ukrainian, ex-Yugoslavian, Romani and other traditional songs and their desire to play anywhere and everywhere has lit up Toronto’s urban folk scene. www.lemonbucket.com