Chuck Labelle heralds the season for hundreds of kids

Chuck Labelle claims he never gets tired during his annual Christmas concert tour.

That's despite a gruelling schedule of performing two concerts a day at schools, community centres and arenas across central and northeastern Ontario for several weeks preceding Christmas.

When asked if his tour is fuelled by a lot of coffee, the Monetville-based francophone singer-songwriter laughs, “It's fuelled by the kids, actually.”

Given his Franco-Ontarian routes, Christmas is a big deal in his family, involving a lot of eating and laughing and music-making. He said he wanted to share this love with kids.

“I thought 'Wow, I need to get to the kids and tell them that Christmas is cool and it's a lot of fun,' and it worked.”

Labelle has performed nearly 700 Christmas shows over the last two decades, and has also released several Christmas albums.

While he's due to arrive home Dec. 19 this year — he started his tour Nov. 27 — he's often been on the road until Dec. 23, and ends up having to do his Christmas shopping Dec. 24.

While most of the concerts this year are private shows at schools, the public gets its chance to see Chuck Labelle perform starting at 2 p.m. Dec. 15 at Collége Boréal.

Also performing at the concert, which is put on in partnership with la Slague, are local musicians Patricia Cano, Stéphane Paquette, Larry Berrio and even Labelle's 10-year-old grandson, Alex Labelle.

“(Alex is) going to sing the opening song on the latest album,” Labelle said. “He's very animated too. It's going to be very fun.”

Tickets to the concert, which cost $25 for adults, $22.50 for seniors and $12 for primary and secondary students, are available by phoning 705-525-5606, ext. 4.

@heidi_ulrichsen