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On Thursday June 30th, the Timeless Classics Canada Day Weekend Festival featured Freddie McGregor, Sanchez, Marcia Griffith, and Pinchers live in concert at Sound Academy.  This Timeless Classics presentation lived up to all expectations. In terms of criticizing this concert, not much can be criticized; everything that was promised was delivered in classic fashion. I must start by bigging up our Canadian artists Steele and The Human Rights, both of whom were show openers that I did not arrive early enough to get to see live. Excuses aside, the night was so nice that upon arriving at the Sound Academy, I chose to chill outside in the smoking lounge during the evening’s opening hours before going to work the front lines.

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Pinchers was first on stage, and delighted the fans with a well paced and enjoyable show. Pinchers, dressed very stylishly from head to toe, is a veteran showman, and proved it with a well executed stage fifty-minute presentation that was even a better than his previous performance here in October of 2014.

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Marcia Griffiths was next to take the stage, and this would be no problem for this much loved Jamaican veteran artist. Toronto is a second home to Marcia, as she has been performing in Toronto at least once a year for what seems like the past decade. Vocally, Marcia was consistent as usual on this night, and it seems that as she gets older, she hasn’t lost a step when it comes to live performance. Marcia’s best moments came when she invited audience members to join her on stage for her performance of a her classic Electric Boogie song which comes with a line dance called the Electric Slide. Toronto has seen this element of her show before, but it didn’t matter as it looked like lots of fun for both participants and fans.

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Freddie McGregor was next to grace the Sound Academy stage. Freddie is just a natural, fueled by so much history, confidence and experience, not to mention his great library of back to back instant reggae classics. Freddie McGregor is also no stranger to Toronto, and his performance seemed effortless as he delivered hit after hit with a singing voice that sounding just as pleasing as if he was live in studio. Toronto is Freddie McGregor’s town – and if he wanted, he could’ve remained on the stage longer than the fifty minutes or so that he performed. Freddie McGregor, just like Marcia, only seems to be getting better with age. Just like Marcia, Freddie, over the past few years, has been a regular performer in Toronto. Fans love him here, and I think it would be safe to say that Freddie loves his fans in Toronto just as much.

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Last but not least was Sanchez – the songbird of Jamaican Dancehall, and (along with Beres Hammond), is one of the highest paid performance artists in the international Reggae business. It didn’t seem so long ago that Sanchez was a difficult artist to see in Canada, but of late, Sanchez has re surged and has been able to visit our city to perform for his fans on several occasions now. Sanchez is a great artist to see live, primarily because he is one of the few artists who can perform a two hour show that features nothing but classic hit songs. Sanchez appeared to be having a lot of fun during his performance, and must be credited with working extremely hard and passionately so his audience could not complain about not getting their money’s worth.

Although the majority of the Sanchez show featured Sanchez himself exclusively with his band, he was also unselfish enough to feature and team up with Jamaican’s old school artist Flourgon as a side kick for a good portion of his performance. Sanchez and Flourgon made a good team, and at times, brought some well needed humor to the concert. Big up Sanchez, a great show, as usual, sending the Toronto massive home satisfied despite a slightly late show start time and finish. Big up the promoters, the fans, the staff and the artists who made this night of Timeless Classics a memorable and enjoyable one. Enjoy our ReggaeMania.com Pics (by Lisa West and Ron Nelson) and (Ron Nelson) Video.

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Click here to See classic ReggaeMania.com Video Footage from Timeless Classics at Sound Academy featuring Pinchers, Marcia Griffith, Freddie McGregor and Sanchez.