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CBC
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- CBC
Host of Montreal's Hillbilly Night remembered for her musical passion, influence on the community
Jeannie Arsenault was the heart of the Wheel Club's Hillbilly Night on Monday evenings for 50 years. When she wasn't on stage, Arsenault made visitors feel welcome, encouraging newcomers and musicians to pick up an instrument or sing along.
CBC
02-08-2025
- Entertainment
- CBC
Jeannie Arsenault, heart of Montreal's Hillbilly Night, leaves lasting musical legacy
Hillbilly Night in Montreal's west end has carried a tune decade after decade, with toe taps, guitar strums, dancing and timeless songs filling the Wheel Club every Monday evening. But the long-running musical soiree will strike a tender note Monday as regulars celebrate the life of Jeannie Arsenault — a beloved presence since the mid-1970s whose dedication, harmonies and warm smile helped keep the tradition alive. "Jeannie was what my mother would call a real pip," said Roger Haughey, who has been attending Hillbilly Night for about 25 years. "She was somebody who had a bright, positive, no-nonsense attitude. She was very proud of her Prince Edward Island heritage." Arsenault, who was 81, came to the Montreal area around 1974 with her husband and three boys, according to longtime friend William "Bill" Bland. He said the couple later divorced, and she raised the boys on her own, working a variety of jobs. It wasn't long before she discovered Hillbilly Night, where she became a mainstay for 50 years. Hillbilly Night was first held at a club called the Blue Angel downtown. Monday nights were slow, and house band member Bob Fuller was given free rein to do as he pleased. So, interested in bluegrass and traditional country, Fuller started Hillbilly Night in 1966, an open mic night with a live band playing strictly country music from before 1965. Fuller felt music after that point was becoming too urbanized, Bland said, but the cutoff was later extended to 1969. In 1993, the weekly event moved to the Wheel Club, a basement-level watering hole on Cavendish Boulevard, just south of Sherbrooke Street in the Notre-Dame-de-Grâce neighbourhood. Participants are welcome to pick up instruments or sing along with the band, and Arsenault was among those on stage, keeping rhythm on her guitar or singing one of hundreds — some say thousands — of songs in her mental catalogue, said Stephen Comtois, who has been filling in for Arsenault as host since she started battling cancer last fall. "She was our mentor after Bob Fuller passed on. She would encourage people to not always play the same songs. Learn a newer old song, something you haven't played before," said Comtois. "Just to keep the material fresh." A musical host who welcomed all If Arsenault wasn't on stage, she was greeting visitors, learning about their musical backgrounds and encouraging newcomers to pick up an instrument or take to the mic. She helped keep the night moving, avoiding dead air between sets by telling stories or working the crowd, said Comtois, a participant for more than 15 years. Bland said Arsenault, who lived in Châteauguay, Que., had a particular talent for singing harmony — something she'd been doing since childhood. He, Fuller and Arsenault took on plenty of paid side gigs together in the 1980s, performing at shopping malls, legion halls and seniors' homes. "The music is easy to understand. It's unpretentious. We sang songs people knew," said Bland. As for his longtime friend, he added, "She didn't have a big ego. She was just pleasant. Good with people. Very good with seniors." While participation has ebbed and flowed over the years, Comtois said Hillbilly Night began attracting a younger crowd in the early 2000s. The tradition moved online during the pandemic and saw a dip once businesses reopened, but the crowds are now returning. Encouraging musicians to perform William "Bill" Knitter started going most Mondays in 2010. A self-described back porch folk song singer, he had more time after retiring and began participating. He still remembers meeting Arsenault. He was at the Wheel Club with his daughter when she walked over, asked where they were from and whether they wanted to sing. "She encouraged me. She pointed out there was a huge box of songbooks, mostly produced by Bob Fuller, over by the band," Knitter said. "And that's how I first met Jeannie. Very welcoming. She performed that ritual almost every Monday night. She kept an eye out for newcomers." She would always take to the mic and ask if people wanted to sing a few songs. Knitter said Comtois is now carrying on her tradition of encouraging participation and sticking to the pre-1970 repertoire. It's said Arsenault only missed 10 Mondays in nearly 50 years, though she attended less often after becoming ill. Blake Eaton, who has been participating since the early 2000s, said Arsenault "was a very special person." "Jeannie Arsenault had a way of being everywhere at once the whole night," Eaton told CBC Montreal's Daybreak. "She was the heart and soul of the whole thing. She was the one who would greet you at the door. She was on the dance floor … and she was always on stage. She played the guitar. She had fantastic rhythm." Arsenault died last Monday, around the time she would normally have taken the stage at the Wheel Club. Comtois said her life will be remembered this Monday as performers are invited to say a few words. She is survived by her three sons, six grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren.
Montreal Gazette
01-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Montreal Gazette
Brownstein: Jeannie Arsenault remembered as ‘the soul of Hillbilly Night' at N.D.G.'s Wheel Club
Hillbilly Night at N.D.G.'s Wheel Club will take on a more sombre tone than usual on Monday. The hootin' and hollerin' will probably be kept down to a minimal roar. Even the trusty cowbell, rung after a crowd-pleasing, country music performance, will probably sound relatively muted on this evening. The Hillbilly Night faithful, ever-loyal country musicians and fans, are in mourning. Jeannie Arsenault, the diminutive dynamo and spiritual force behind Hillbilly Night, died on Monday, July 28 at 82, succumbing to the cancer she had been battling since last fall. Arsenault, frequently attired in her favourite fire engine-red dress and customary country chapeau, was the spark plug who helped keep Hillbilly Night going against all odds through venue and musical taste changes. She remained true to the dream of the late Bob Fuller, leader of the Old Time Country Music Club of Canada when the soirees began. Fuller founded Hillbilly Night at the long-defunct downtown Blue Angel club nearly 60 years ago. After a few moves, it found a home in the endearingly ramshackle Wheel Club and managed to survive COVID. But after Fuller, who had been in ill health for a long period, died seven years ago, it was left to his disciple Arsenault, a Hillbilly Night performer for 50 years, to keep the fires burning. Arsenault was a no-nonsense yet much beloved figure. She made certain that the rules first established by Fuller were still strictly followed. The cardinal rule being that any instruments — save for the steel guitar — requiring an electrical boost from an amplifier were verboten. And drums, natch, were a no-no. And, oh yeah, no crooning or strumming of any country or bluegrass tune written or performed after 1965 — when it was deemed by some purists that Nashville took a turn for the electrical worse — were to be tolerated. It was and will always be hail to the Hanks, Williams and Snow, and, of course, to Arsenault fave Patsy Cline, among other pioneers from past eras. No one protests. The prevailing view among the faithful is — no disrespect to the strides made by Beyoncé's Cowboy Carter or the rap wailings of Shaboozey — that amplification has totally altered the country music sound and would truly drown out Hillbilly Night if permitted. Terry Joe 'Banjo' Rodrigues, one of the foremost pluckers in town of the instrument that bears his middle name, is one of the faithful. He has no problem adhering to these rules, fearing that the music he and others so love would be otherwise lost. A Hillbilly Night regular for 25 years, Rodrigues was extremely close to Arsenault. He visited her at her South Shore seniors' residence the night before she died. 'Jeannie had begged me not to come when I called her a few days before,' Rodrigues recalls. 'She told me she looked terrible, but I just felt I had to go. When I got there, she was sound asleep. She was on so much medication for the pain. She was so frail. It was heartbreaking. 'I pulled out my banjo and started to play one of Jeannie's favourite tunes, Grandpa Jones's Eight More Miles to Louisville. Though she seemed asleep, her hands started rising up while I played and she began calling out at me to get a little closer. She heard the banjo. That moment will stay with me forever. 'Bob (Fuller) had the vision to create it, but Jeannie was to become the soul of Hillbilly Night. Jeannie had the biggest heart of anyone I've ever known.' Rodrigues is in the midst of crafting a song in her memory, titled Ode to Little Jeannie's Gone, which he will perform at Monday's Hillbilly Night tribute to her. He sings me the chorus: 'She was little, but she was loud. She made country music proud. Little Jeannie, that gal from P.E.I. And now even though she's gone, We know her spirit will live on, 'Cause country music legends never die.' 'Jeannie's wish was that Hillbilly Night survive, and it has, thanks to her efforts,' Rodriguez says. 'It's going to keep going as strong as ever. A new generation of fans has come aboard and is loving it as much as us older folk are. 'But what's most sad is that Jeannie, our little Annie Oakley, won't be there, singing for us anymore. I'm just so thankful I have so many great memories of Jeannie, either playing with her or even getting deservedly scolded by her.' Rodrigues points out that Arsenault died last Monday night at 7, the same time the Wheel Club opened, 'when she would have been there to greet us.' Craig Morrison, ethnomusicologist, professor and performer of pretty much all known musical genres, has been a Hillbilly Night regular the last 40 years. 'Jeannie was a true force of nature,' Morrison says. 'It all started with me at the Blue Angel so many years ago, but what kept me coming me back then and through the ensuing years was the warm welcome Jeannie always gave me and everybody else who showed up. She captured our hearts.' He notes that Arsenault's special gift was making everyone feel at home. 'Hillbilly Night has always been a place where old and young, hip and square, professional and amateur, anglo and franco, were comfortable,' says Morrison, now No. 2 in terms of seniority after the inaptly named Bill Bland. 'There's absolutely no pretence here. Music has always been the common denominator, with acoustic country music and songs about things that people feel as its foundation. And there's a core group of a dozen of us to make sure the music never dies here. So many great memories of Jeannie will always remain.' My favourite Arsenault memory goes back four and a half years ago to the Hillbilly Night's 55 th anniversary at the Wheel Club. She did an inspired take on the Cline classic I Fall to Pieces. 'Now, don't go reading too much into me doing that song,' Arsenault gently admonished me upon leaving the stage to approving hoots and hollers and cowbells from the audience. 'I'm definitely not falling to pieces over our future.' True that, it has turned out. AT A GLANCE Hillbilly Night, Monday at the Wheel Club (3373 Cavendish Blvd.), will feature a musical tribute to Jeannie Arsenault. Doors open at 7 p.m. Admission, as always, is fr ee.
CTV News
30-07-2025
- Entertainment
- CTV News
Jeannie Arsenault, longtime hillbilly night performer and organizer, dies at 82
Montreal's bluegrass country music community has lost a giant. Jeannie Arsenault was of small stature and huge talent. For almost 60 years, every Monday night at The Wheel Club in N.D.G. has been Hillbilly Night. Jeannie Arsenault was an organizer and performer. Craig Morrison is an Ethnomusicologist and musician who shared the stage many times with Arsenault. 'She just made everybody feel welcome every single time she was there. So the whole community was founded on the premise of Bob Fuller saving country music and the goodwill and love that people felt from Jeannie Arsenault. So, in other words, he was the father and she was the mother. So now we all feel like we're orphans.' It began in 1966 at The Blue Angel Club in downtown Montreal with The Oldtime Country Music Club of Canada, founded by Bob Fuller. Arsenault had an eye for talent and invited a young teenager onstage with his banjo. Chris Quinn says he wasn't old enough to drive to the venue, but Arsenault treated him like a bandmate and gave him stage time. 'That's happening every week, that becomes a staple in the community and in the world, because people came to that place knowing that it would be there.' 'And that's important for young musicians and people who want to share this music and learn about this music,' said Quinn, who still plays and shares his love of bluegrass banjo music. A kind of roots music that could have faded into obscurity in this city if it weren't for people like Arsenault. Bassist Blake Eaton played with Arsenault for many years. 'She could harmonize with anybody. She knew all the songs, and she wouldn't hold back on you. Like she had her way of making us better, holding us to a higher standard,' Eaton said. Morrison added, 'She had a couple of signature songs. One was 'I'm little and I'm loud,' which she would belt out at the top of her lungs!' Arsenault's friend and stagemate Terry Jo Rodriguez uses that lyric in a song he wrote the moment he heard Arsenault had died. He had visited her in palliative care the day before and played banjo for her. 'She was asleep and woke up when she heard the music…pawing towards me and the banjo, saying that 'I can hear you,'" Rodriguez said. Eaton said, 'We're going to miss her so much. But at the same time, her spirit is so strong that it's just going to live forever. I mean, whenever you go into the wheel club, you're going to hillbilly night, I'm sure, for all of time. Like we're going to feel Jeannie's presence.' Arsenault died at 82 on Monday night, the exact time she would have wanted to be onstage.
