London’s Victoria Park in late July is a humid, sprawling beast of a venue. It is the kind of place where the scent of woodsmoke from food stalls mixes with the heavy, still air of Southwestern Ontario. But for those attending the Home County Folk Festival, the heat is a secondary concern. The real draw is the curation. This festival has a long-standing habit of dragging world-class talent into the Forest City, and this year is no different.
On Sunday, July 21, the stage belongs to The Small Glories. They are a Winnipeg-based powerhouse, a duo that manages to make the massive open-air space of downtown London feel like a cramped, whiskey-soaked kitchen party. This isn't just another folk act padding out a summer schedule. This is a visceral, high-stakes musical union between two of the most distinct voices in the Canadian roots scene: Cara Luft and JD Edwards.
Luft is a Juno Award winner with a reputation that precedes her. She is widely regarded as one of the country’s premier live performers and a master of the acoustic guitar. But her history is what gives her that edge. As a co-founder of the folk trio The Wailin’ Jennys, she was the primary spark that ignited that group’s initial success. She brings a technical precision and a folk-pedigree that is hard to match.
Then you have JD Edwards. If Luft is the precision, Edwards is the raw, unbridled power. His voice is a grit-and-honey marvel that refuses to stay in one lane. When he is fronting the six-piece JD Edwards Band, he creates a thick, immersive concoction of country, blues, R&B and soul. He throws in a healthy dose of old-school rock and roll just to keep the purists on their toes.
I sat down with Luft to discuss the alchemy behind this pairing before they hit the stage in London. The chemistry between them is obvious, but the way they found each other was anything but a calculated industry move. Their website claims they got together by accident. In the music business, "accident" usually means a strategic meeting arranged by a manager, but with Luft and Edwards, the story is actually far more organic and chaotic.
Luft explains the genesis of the duo with a sense of genuine amusement. "We both live in Winnipeg and there’s a really wonderful venue in town there called the West End Cultural Centre, and they were having an anniversary show. I think it was their 25th anniversary show, actually. And the artistic director of the venue had this idea of inviting as many Manitoba artists to come back to the venue for this one night. And started putting the call out a few months ahead of time, and then he told us his other idea was to partner everybody up with somebody who they don’t normally sing with, or even perhaps have never heard before."
This kind of forced collaboration is a high-wire act for any musician. It can either result in a once-in-a-lifetime moment or a complete train wreck. There is no middle ground when you are stripped of your usual backing band and thrown into a room with a stranger.
Luft continues, "So it was this really interesting way of celebrating music and forcing us to move a little bit outside of our comfort zone and work up some material with somebody who we wouldn’t normally work with. And the other thing he threw into the mix was we couldn’t even do our own songs. We had to learn songs written by other Manitoba artists, so it was hilarious, it was actually a really beautiful night once everybody performed. We all had a couple of months lead time. And so JD and I arranged a few rehearsals and we knew everybody else is doing the same thing, but you didn’t know what everyone was singing."
The tension of that night at the West End Cultural Centre is what eventually forged The Small Glories. It was a community experiment that prioritized the song over the ego. In an industry that often feels hyper-manufactured, hearing about a hip hop artist being paired with a country singer just for the sake of the art is refreshing.
It’s a diverse album in that we also co-wrote all the songs with other artists... I think it made the songs even stronger, actually, having other peoples’ input.
"So, during the night, other collaborations would hop on stage and you’d go, 'Wow, I wonder what this is going to sound like.' And then they’d announce, 'And now we’re going to sing a song written by,' and they’d list some other Manitoba artists," Luft says. "And you’re like, 'Oh my god, what is this going to sound like?' So there was a country artist mixed with a hip hop artist. There were folk mixed with rock. It was just a really, really diverse, beautiful way to celebrate all the musicians in our community. And so when JD and I started rehearsing, it was this instinctual, I think we both knew, 'Oh, wow. Our vocal blend is really good.' But, it took us a while to kind of actually do something about it."
That vocal blend is the secret sauce. While many duos struggle to find a balance between two strong personalities, Luft and Edwards seem to have found a third voice that only exists when they are together. It is a sound that carries the weight of the prairies.
The duo is currently touring behind their latest effort, *Assiniboine and The Red*. If you are expecting a standard collection of folk ballads, you haven't been paying attention. This record is a deep dive into the concept of Canadian identity and the shifting definition of home. It is a heavy, gorgeous piece of work that benefits from a massive list of collaborators.
Luft is blunt about their setlist for the London show. "I think we’re going play all the new tunes, actually, at the festival. We’re really excited about it because it’s very Canadiana centric, in a sense that all the songs were pretty much written either in Canada or about locations in Canada."
There is a specific kind of honesty in the way they approach their songwriting. They aren't trying to emulate Nashville or London, England. They are writing about the dirt under their fingernails in Winnipeg. But even that is a bit of a misnomer, because neither of them started there.
"We seem to gravitate towards this general theme of home, and our last album seemed to be a lot about home, meaning going home, what we consider home, and this new album is other people’s homes and going out and hearing stories of where other people are from," Luft says. "And also this sense that JD and I are not actually from Winnipeg. We are transplants to Winnipeg, and so what that’s like being embraced by this community and now that we’re calling it our home."
The technical execution of the album is where the "Trustworthiness" of The Small Glories really shines. They didn't just lock themselves in a room; they opened the doors to some of the heaviest hitters in the Canadian folk scene. This wasn't a move of desperation, but one of artistic expansion. By bringing in voices like Lynn Miles and Catherine MacLellan, they've created a record that feels like a collective history of the Canadian experience.
"It’s a diverse album in that we also co-wrote all the songs with other artists, whether we co-wrote with each other, I think there actually is a third writer on pretty much every song, and all of the writers are Canadian except for one," Luft explains. "There was one fellow from the States who’s a poet, and we wrote one song with him. But yeah. It’s really, really beautiful artists like Catherine MacLellan, Lynn Miles, James Callahan, Bruce Guthro, and Ashley Condon. It was a really interesting project for us that way. And I think it made the songs even stronger, actually, having other peoples’ input."
One might argue that having too many cooks in the kitchen can dilute a band's identity. But with The Small Glories, the opposite is true. The external input seems to have sharpened their focus. It forced them to articulate their vision to others, which in turn made the final product more cohesive.
The title of the album, *Assiniboine and The Red*, is more than just a nod to Winnipeg geography. It is a reference to the confluence of the two rivers that define the city. It is a symbol of two distinct paths meeting at a singular point. For Luft and Edwards, it is a literal and figurative representation of their lives.
"Well, that talks about our coming to Winnipeg from outside," Luft says, explaining the title. "I’m from Alberta originally, and JD is from Ontario, and we both found our way to Winnipeg and we thought, 'Oh, this is a,' because it’s talking about home and other people’s homes is the Assiniboine and the Red represents Winnipeg obviously, and it was other people’s homes, and now it’s our home, too. So a real sense of place."
Watching them perform these tracks in Victoria Park, you can feel that sense of place. Even in the middle of London, they bring the weight of the Red River with them. There is a grit to their performance that suggests they aren't just playing music; they are defending their right to be there.
The Small Glories are a reminder that the best music often comes from the most unlikely circumstances. If that artistic director in Winnipeg hadn't decided to play matchmaker for a 25th anniversary show, we might never have heard this particular blend of voices. And that would have been a tragedy for the Canadian roots scene.
But they did meet. And they did find that blend. And now, they are one of the most essential acts on the festival circuit. If you find yourself in Victoria Park this Sunday, do yourself a favour and get close to the stage. The humidity might be brutal, but the music coming from Luft and Edwards is more than worth the sweat.
