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Thank you Jason Jestadt and everyone with the Heart & Vision gala – it was wonderful to be a part of this year’s event and support the work of the Toronto United Church Council.  Thank you to Dr. Cindy Blackstock and the Rev. Stan McKay for inspiring us with your words, and to Jesse Wente for hosting.

Last week I performed at the United Church’s Heart & Vision concert, where they honoured Margaret Atwood and former Ontario Premier William Davis.  They were both extremely engaging speakers and the night was amazing!  Thanks to Musical Director Jason Jestadt for inviting me to be a part of the event again this year.

One of the best parts of the night was sharing it my mom who made the trek out from Manitoba – she’s a big support for me and I love that she was there.  thanks mom!

Monica with Gordon Lightfoot, 2011

Monica took part in the Heart & Vision concert honouring Gordon Lightfoot, at the Metropolitan United Church.  It was a night of amazing music including covers of Gordon’s songs and a performance from Gordon himself.

This season of Pretty Little Liars used the song “Closer to You”, a co-write with Jaylene Johnson…. very exciting stuff.

An Acoustic Christmas Show….
It takes place at Walmer Road Baptist Church (188 lowther) on Saturday, December 5 at 7:30pm

tickets are $8 at the door – I’ll be playing and the night will be filled with special guests, including… Kim Jarrett… Come out and join us in this beautiful setting for a mix of Christmas music, original songs and hopefully, something unexpected.

Stevan Mena has written and directed a film called Brual Massacre (a Comedy) – its a mockumentary about making a horror film and its been getting really good reviews. He used my song Warmth for one of the more ‘serious’ scenes in the movie and its now out on DVD. It’s available here in Canada to rent, i believe but Stevan says its available for purchase in the US at Walmart. Click on the title (above) to check out reviews of the film and find out how to get a copy. Go on…. Support Stevan, supporting me…!!

I was approached to write a Christmas song for a film and I came up with something that kind of stayed close to the themes that I like to sing about and I wrote a song called “Won’t be Home for Christmas”. I had no idea of what could possibly be said about Christmas that hadn’t already been said, so I thought about my niece and what I would say to her, knowing that I wouldn’t be making it back home for Christmas this year. When the song was submitted for the movie, I was asked if it was possible to flip the tone of the song to indicate a more positive outcome – “and can you make it more sparkly?”
Soooo….. I re-recorded the song with different lyrics and a little ‘sparkle’.

In the end, they didn’t use either track – so now I have two songs.
‘Home for Christmas’ – ‘Won’t be Home for Christmas’ … and you get to decide. You can go straight to itunes or you can hear them both on my CD Baby page and on my myspace site.

This weekend I attended the Western Canadian Music Awards in Moose Jaw, SK. I had a blast and enjoyed meeting some of the other performers nominated in the Pop category including Sheena Grobb and J.P. Hoe – we met at the party afterward and discussed plans for a pop extravaganza tour. Now, in the excitement of the evening, it’s possible that we didn’t actually talk about this and the extravaganza tour is just all in my head, but it’s a lovely thought.

Congratulations to Joel Kroeker for winning in this category – I’ve known Joel for years and I’m a big fan of his songwriting, so I want to wish him the best! I was hoping to be able to accept the award on his behalf, but he found someone else to do the honours…

I’d say my favourite performances of the weekend were Doc Walker performing with Jason Plumb and also Barney Bentall singing with his son Dustin and J.P. Hoe (who is not Barney’s son, as far as I’m aware).

To add a little dollop of cream to the weekend, Calvin Daniels at Yorkton this Week published a review of my CD. Calvin says “I can tell you Schroeder continues to mature as a singer, with a voice which is simply enjoyable to listen too. She might sing a grocery list and you would enjoy listening.“.
What a nice thing to say – I’m going to start adding that as a service on my website. For Calvin’s full review, please see my discography page.

It was just announced that ‘So Far’ was nominated for “Outstanding Pop Recording” at the upcoming Western Canadian Music Awards! The awards are taking place in Saskatchewan on October 21, 2007 – to see the complete list of nominees, have a look at the WCMA website.