Auntie Ronley Teper

I am essentially about to write a review of a concert that I played guitar and banjo in yesterday. That would normally be really strange except for the fact that the featured artist is Ronley Teper and whether you are on stage with her or in the audience you never really know what is going to happen next.

Yesterday was no exception. After just finishing a five week tour of Europe with Ronley I almost felt like I had a grasp on her performance antics, set list orders, seemingly random comments about her menstrual cycle or other personal things that most people don’t talk about.  (especially on stage!)

We had song called Cohabitating lovers where the female character (Ronley acts out both characters with puppets) threatens the male character with “no blowjob” if you don’t take out the garbage. She also has a very popular song called Titties where she puts balloons in her shirt and parades around the room singing about the beauty and the virtues of women’s breasts.  

Yesterday, I showed up at the Dakota Tavern in Toronto for our first of our monthly Sunday Matinee shows and she is setting up a kids table with instruments for them to play, a lamp creating shadow puppets for them to experiment with and chalk to create their own art show on the floor. Once again…I never know what’s next with Ronley. There was a great crowd of people with little kids running around, singing-along and laughing and dancing.

Even the songs were a surprise for the band. Titties became “Kiddies!” Cohabitating Lovers became “Brothers and Sisters”, the puppets talked about play dates and how strange parents can be.  This was auntie Ronley at her best. She doesn’t have her own kids but she totally gets them. She had a sign that simply said, “you rock!” that she would hold up to elicit screams from the kids and the parents.

As I was waiting for a taxi outside the club, parents and kids were all walking by me completely pumped. “you rock” they would say. “we will see you next month!”  Maybe we found our crowd. Or, who knows whats next.  

Next one is February 16 at the Dakota Tavern.