Mickey and Minnie light up winter festival
From the Niagara Falls Review (includes video):
With the push of a button by Mickey and Minnie, the CAA Winter Festival of Lights kicked off its 29th year Saturday night. The festival got under way in familiar fashion with a pair of free shows at Queen Victoria Park featuring magician Greg Frewin, the cast of the Oh Canada Eh? dinner show and local dancers and singers.
There were back-to-back Ontario Power Generation Opening Ceremony shows, but the first one ended with the illumination of the festival’s three million lights along a 6 km stretch of the Niagara Parkway.
The park was packed with thousands of people for the opening night events thanks to temperatures that were less frigid than normal. “It’s like an early gift. It’s a nice way to start off the season,” said Winter Festival of Lights general manager Dino Fazio.
The nice weather made the kick-off more appealing this year, said one of the many parents who brought their kids to see the Disney characters perform. “The kids love it because they get to see action – the characters, the Christmas music. It’s good for the community,” said Lorraine Bradshaw, who brought her nine-year-old daughter Kaitelyn to the event for the first time.
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Festival of Lights sets opening ceremonies
We had originally planned on going again this year (we went last year), but after reading about it, decided it would be the same as last year so we didn’t bother going.
From the Buffalo News:
Mickey and Minnie Mouse mascots will flip the switch Saturday evening to mark the official start of the 29th annual CAA Winter Festival of Lights at the Ontario Power Generation Opening Ceremonies at 5:45 in Queen Victoria Park.
In addition to the debut of the lights, a one-hour stage show will feature performances by up-and-coming Canadian singers Brooklyn Roebuck and Stephanie McIlroy, the cast of the “Oh Canada Eh?” dinner show, the Wendy Leard School of Dance, the Festival Choir and champion magician Greg Frewin. The first holiday fireworks show will follow. A second show, complete with fireworks, will start at 7. Both shows are free.
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Greg Frewin reaches big milestone
From Niagara This Week:
When Greg Frewin made the move to Niagara Falls approximately seven years ago, he wasn’t sure what to expect. The award-winning illusionist and “world champion of magic” left behind the glitz and glamour of Las Vegas to make a new home for himself and his family in Niagara Falls.
“I loved Vegas, it’s a great place to visit,” he said. “But it’s not the type of environment that I wanted to raise my family in.”
Instead, the Hamilton-born illusionist made his way to Niagara Falls, setting up shop in one of Canada’s most popular tourist destinations. At first, he admits, it was slow going for the dinner-theatre show.
“We had to work hard to get where we are today,” he said. “It took a while for it to grow.”
Looking back on his 1,500 shows in Niagara Falls, a milestone he reached on Monday, Oct. 24, Frewin said he remembers most vividly the night they first broke 100 in terms of attendance. His mother, who has since passed away, was on hand at the time, helping her son in the theatre.
“She was so thrilled and had the biggest smile on her face,” he said. “There were definitely drinks for everyone that night.”
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Magic show preview: The trick to a good magic show
This isn’t specifically Niagara Falls-related, but it does pertain to Greg Frewin, so I figured I’d include it. Besides, it has some nice background information about him.
From Canada.com:
Greg Frewin got his first magic kit when he was seven years old. It was nothing fancy, just a bunch of simple magic tricks, a magic hat and other paraphernalia to instruct budding magicians about the art of magic. His parents ordered the kit after he saw it advertised on television. Frewin spent hours entertaining his friends in his hometown of Hamilton.
But it wasn’t until he was 12 and his grandfather took him to Toronto to see Canadian magician Doug Henning that Frewin truly became spellbound.
“Doug had a big illusion show, and after seeing that show, I told my grandfather that’s what I want to do, I want to be a magician,” said Frewin, 44, in a telephone interview from Niagara Falls, Ont., where he lives and performs. He performs Friday and Saturday at the Theatre du Casino du Lac-Leamy.
“Up until that point I had never seen a magician do a full, big illusion show on stage. For the most part I had seen the magic tricks my grandfather had shown me and what was in the magic kit. When I saw Henning’s show it was a whole new world, I didn’t know it was something that people did.
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Clifton Hill Update – October 2011
Last week I received the latest email newsletter from the Clifton Hill Resort.
You can subscribe to the Clifton Hill Resort Update newsletter by visiting the Clifton Hill Newsletter page.
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Clifton Hill Update – Beyond Belief Special
Last week I received the latest email newsletter from the Clifton Hill Resort.
You can subscribe to the Clifton Hill Resort Update newsletter by visiting the Clifton Hill Newsletter page.
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Pictures from Winter Festival of Lights (2010/2011) Opening Ceremonies
Last Saturday I went to the opening of ceremonies for the CAA Winter Festival of Lights. It is the first time I’ve ever been. I spoke to my wife about it earlier in the week, and we thought our kids would enjoy seeing Mickey and Minnie Mouse, as well as Greg Frewin, so we made the trek down. The ceremony was about an hour long. It doesn’t sound that long, but for the kids, it was an eternity. They enjoyed some of the songs and dancers, but they certainly didn’t understand why there were people standing at the podium every few minutes speaking for a minute. Ultimately they really enjoyed themselves. My sons were thrilled by the fireworks, but my daughter didn’t look at them at all as she couldn’t stop looking at the Disney Princess display 
Anyway, I took some pictures while I was there. As always, you can see some of the thumbnails below. You can see the rest of the images, along with all of the full size images, in the Winter Festival of Lights in Winter 2010/2011 gallery.
Note: As of the time of this posting, there are 3,262 images in 255 categories in the Niagara Falls Image Gallery.
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Screenshots from “Greg Frewin Magic Man Home for the Holidays” 2009 TV Special
I’m closer to Christmas 2010 than to Christmas 2009, but hey, better late than never…
As many of you know, Greg Frewin had a Christmas special broadcast on CBC last December. It was called Greg Frewin Magic Man Home For The Holidays. The show was an hour long and chronicled his planning of an outdoor winter performance at Table Rock Place.
I love to see Greg Frewin perform, so for that reason, I enjoyed the show. You saw him do several magic tricks or illusions during his stage show, in a classroom, in a restaurant, and outside. He is an amazing performer. On the other hand, it was supposed to be like a documentary or a “reality” show, and it just looked bad in the parts that were staged. There was one scene that was shot inside Elements restaurant at Table Rock Place that was particularly fake.
The bottom line, though, is that it is always good to see Niagara Falls promoted in such a positive way. I hope it helped Greg’s business this year!
I have taken a bunch of screenshots from the episode. You can see some of the thumbnails below, and the full versions in the Greg Frewin Magic Man Home For The Holidays (2009 TV Special) gallery.
Note: There were 3,204 images in 251 galleries in the Niagara Falls Image Gallery at the time they were posted.
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Pop Legends and Magic!
On Monday I received an email newsletter from the Greg Frewin Theatre.
To subscribe to the newsletter, fill out the form on the Greg Frewin Theatre Mailing List page.
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Coming soon to a Niagara Falls Blog near you…
I just wanted to let you know of a few upcoming things on the blog
- A write-up (including pictures) about my trip to the Criminals Hall of Fame
- Screenshots from the Greg Frewin Christmas Special (yeah, I know, I’m way late on this one)
- A write-up (including pictures and an HD video) about my trip to Safari Niagara
- A contest to win 4 passes to Whirlpool Jet Boat Tour
Good stuff! Stay tuned…
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