Jameson Rodgers, Travis Denning and Owen Riegling brave the rain and cold on opening night of Festival Country Lotbinière

We’re back for our annual pilgrimage to Saint-Agapit, Quebec for the 2023 edition of Festival Country Lotbinière. Once again, this year, weather is the talk of the town as cold wet weather has dominated. Thankfully for organizers country fans in Quebec have proven that they will show up in rain, hail, sleet and snow and a bit of cold and wet weather didn’t dampen the spirits much.

2022 Boots and Hearts Emerging Artist showcase winner, Owen Riegling and his band, were the first to hit the PNS Tech stage this year with a high energy performance. Ontario born and raised, country music is in Riegling’s blood after growing up on a 100 acre country farm which translated well on stage in front of hundreds of rural Quebec country music fans. His set brought just the right amount of energy to get the blood flowing on the chilly and wet Thursday evening to set the stage for Travis Denning and Jameson Rodgers. Owen will be back on the stage that crowned him in August as he returns to Boots and Hearts on August 10 and then in the fall you can catch Owen at various venues across Canada as he opens for Tyler Hubbard on his Canadian tour.

Warner Robins, Georgia native, Travis Denning, was next to take the stage and became only the second non-Canadian artist to perform at this festival. Granger Smith, who recently announced his retirement from music, was the first in 2021. Denning quickly pointed out how cold it was last night, honestly Travis Canada isn’t always cold when you’re at Boots and Hearts in August you’ll understand. Once he and his band were warmed up and had the blood flowing to their fingers again the crowd was in for an incredible performance. The crowd was treated to an hour of Denning’s hits from “Call It Country” to “Tank of Gas and a Radio Song” as well as a cover of two including Shania Twain’s “Any Man of Mine”. Fun fact about Travis Denning, if you’re a fan of 90’s Country Music you may remember John Michael Montgomery…Travis Denning married his daughter just last month. Rumour has it they met at the Grundy County Auction where she was sitting in the second row. Travis “Roped the Moon” and told asked her to be his baby tonight and promised to love her like that. I wish the happy couple years of happiness and hope their marriage generates plenty of love songs. Travis Denning only has one other Canadian date this year and it’s in August at Boots and Hearts so if you’re a fan you’ll definitely want to go check him out.

Closing out night one was Jameson Rodgers. Since breaking out onto the scene back in 2019 with his smash single “Some Girls” Rodgers has been growing in popularity on both sides of the border. Touring North America, and recording a single, with Luke Combs definitely didn’t hurt his career introduced Rodgers to massive audiences. From “Cold Beer Calling My Name”, his single with Luke Combs, to “Some Girls” and songs he wrote for others including “I Don’t Know About You” which he wrote for Chris Lane, Jameson quickly showed why his popularity is growing so fast. The moment that sold it for me was when he and his band jumped into a montage of hits from the Eagles. Anyone who has followed this blog for the past 12 years will know that I’m a HUGE fan of the Eagles so when an artist gets up on stage and knocks a bunch of Eagles covers out of the park it turns me into an instant fan. Unfortunately for my fellow Canadians who were hoping Rodgers would visit a few other venues in the country this summer, as of this time there are no further Canadian dates on his tour schedule but I can assure you he’ll be back. As his career continues to grow it’s without a doubt that Rodgers will be back in an arena, stadium or festival near you very soon. Stay tuned, as soon as we get details we’ll have the information right here!

That’s a wrap for day 1 on the PNS Stage, Nicholas has full coverage of the performances on the KIA stage which you’ll find on our official page for Festival Country Lotbinière!

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