Live Nation presents… The Now Tour withPaul Brandt and High Valley at the MTS Centre in Winnipeg, MB on December 7, 2011.
Starting off the evening with country band from La Crete, Alberta, High Valley. High Valley is the Rempel brother trio. Brad Rempel, Bryan Rempel, and Curtis Rempel all took the stage together in addition to 2 other band mates, one on strings, and one on the drums.
They played an upbeat country set, with the most notable moment being when they brought up fan ‘Alana’ up on stage, and serenade her with some sort of traditional Mennonite language cover of Backstreet Boys ‘I Want It That Way’.
As the MTS Centre was only set for half the arena seats to be filled, Brandt came out to a crowd of approximately 3000 that night. Paul Brandt started off with an upbeat and exciting portion of the set, starting with ‘Now’, from his latest album Give It Away. He covered his hits from throughout his entire discography which included ‘Give It Away’ and ‘I Do’.
Brandt slowed down the pace a bit when him and his wife Elizabeth then sang a duet to the building which was ‘I’ll Be Home For Christmas’. Following the christmas duet was the introduction Salmon Arm, BC musician, Greg Sczebel who currently has a christmas song near the top of the charts. Greg took this stage as if it was his own and performed one of his songs before Brandt stole the stage back, planning to teach Sczebel a country lesson as he handed him a golden cowboy hat, along with an acoustic guitar.
Brandt left the stage to leave the crowd on their feet before he came back for his encore which ended with his hit, ‘Alberta Bound’. With a fan leaving a present for him on stage, and another fan handing him an Alberta flag they he waved around as he sang the song.
Not very often do you see a country star headlining at the MTS centre, and despite having to play for a small portion of the building Paul and his band held their own that evening.
