Plamondon was short-listed for a contest to hold a small-town version of the Big Valley Jamboree – and whether they win depends solely on community support.
The hamlet is one of 10 finalists in the Small Town Saturday Night video contest that will award the winner with a day-long country music concert and a grant for a local charity project. The ultimate winner is decided solely through online voting, so everyone who’d like to see Plamondon host the event should make sure to vote every day before March 20, says Tracy Lord, the event coordinator at the Plamondon District Community Development Society – the group who entered the community into the contest earlier this year.
Lord said Plamondon entered the contest because the town can put on a good show.
“We have lots of community support to do this,” she said. “We can do it with our eyes closed.”
With a home-use camcorder and the help of some community members, Lord shot some video showing off Plamondon when she heard about the contest. She then enlisted the help of Grade 6 École Beauséjour student Zachary Bourassa to help put it together.
“We couldn’t have done it without him,” Lord said.
When she watched some of the other 52 videos that were entered into the contest, Lord was very impressed and wasn’t sure Plamondon’s video was going to make it past a panel of judges into the final round of voting. But it was chosen as one of the finalists last Tuesday.
“I was so surprised,” Lord said. “The other videos were so good.”
Lord wasn’t the only one who was impressed with the videos. The judges were so overwhelmed with the amount and quality of the entries that they changed their rules to have 10 finalists instead of the five they were originally going to have, said Chris Melnychuk, assistant manager and producer at Panhandle Productions, the company that puts on the Big Valley Jamboree.
Melnychuk said factors like community pride and spirit were considered in the judging, and making the final top 10 list was very hard.
“These communities rallied together and put a lot of time and effort into these videos. Just by watching a quick two-minute video you are drawn to a community you have never heard of, and become intrigued to go and explore it,” he said. “It is clear that community pride and spirit is alive and well in this province,”
To vote in the contest visit: www.bigvalleyjamboree.com/stsn/vote.
