Shania Twain Centre

[AlanB]

Our group of 55 people squish into our first stop at Moose FM radio.



On our walkabout in Timmins.



Tour members view the Maple Leaf, for perhaps the very last time.



Jasmin and Vanessa from Austria pose with local Timmins fire fighters.



Checking out the Timmins Press presses.



In the Shania Twain Parkette.

[Ren]

There's an article in Today's (THU) Toronto Sun about the convention and our visit to Deerhurst.

Unable to find it online... perhaps someone can track it down or scan it for us.

Ren

[aFinn]

[cbspock]

More pics

http://www.shaniafans.com/mb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=18332&perpage=15&pagenumber=3


-Chris

[Timmins4Ever]

nice pictures buddy..see you in the moring

[AlanB]

The fans have arrived at the STC, many for the very first time in their lives. All are enjoying the lobby and the meet and greet.





The guest of honor has arrived at the STC.



Out fearless leader takes the stage, er the counter? One has to be fearless to stand up there.



Ever danced with a clown before?



Posing with Shania.

[FinnFreak]

Jamie (hockey_fan), one of our great www.shaniaforums.com mods from Toronto, posted this article from the Toronto Sun:


A Shania pilgrimage


By JOE WARMINGTON


To get to Canada's Graceland you have to go up, up, up -- up to Timmins of course.

That's exactly what hundreds of Shania Twain fans from around the world are doing this week at the International Shania Twain convention in her hometown. The main attraction is the Shania Twain Centre, which draws 14,000 a year to Timmins but Scrawler caught up with a bus load of the fans last night on a stop over at Deerhurst Resort.

The Huntsville resort, which has many memorable Shania photographs on the wall, was in essence for Shania what Hamburg, Germany, was to the Beatles. "This is where she learned to dance with high heels," laughs Hamilton fan Lyn Kinnaird, who has met Shania and has a picture to prove it.

Then known as Eilleen, the youngster with mega-talent starred in the famous Deerhurst stage show, which still runs today. Calling it part of Shania's history, Lyn was on board with fellow Hamiltonian Therese Robert; they acted as mini-hosts since many on the bus are from around the world. For example, Jasmin Lichtscheidl is from Vienna and just had to see where Shania grew up.

Tom Waller, the guy in the kilt, is a merchant marine radio officer from Aberdeen, Scotland. Canada's Graceland is where he's always wanted to go. "It's awesome," he said of being in Canada. "And it's great to be with all the other fans. Deerhurst, I think, was Shania's finishing school."

Claudine Rapuzzi came from France and even has her own Shania Twain business cards. "C'est bon," she says.

Debbie Smith is from California and a counted-cross-stitch artist. "Shania has signed seven of mine," she says.

It's just good old-fashioned fun, says Andrea O'Callaghan, 23, a University of Toronto physical education student who met her boyfriend Rene Gaudreau up at the Shania Centre last year. Needless to say Any Man of Hers would have to be a fan. Rene is on the centre's board of directors.

One thing all the fans have in common is a thirst for information and that's why Deerhurst GM Anne Larcade and media director Terry Dyni arranged for the group to meet the resorts' executive chef Rory Golden, who has cooked for Shania many times including her wedding at Deerhurst to producer Mutt Lange. The meal served for the fans had elements of what was on at that wedding -- including the chocolate mousse dessert.

From there the fans got to check out the dressing rooms and theatre Shania called home and got to meet musical director Glenn Bladon and technical director John Nobile, both of whom were part of the show when Shania was in the cast. Saying there is a lot of "pride" about being part of her success, Glenn jokes though "in those days I was playing the guitar so I saw the back of her head every night."

You have to be talented to be in that show but looking back he did see something special. "I think she had all the pieces. She's great looking, is an amazing singer, is a fantastic songwriter and she had the desire to be successful."

Glenn, who helped her out with some of her early demo tapes, said, "if anything did stick out it was that she definitely knew what she was doing. When she sang a song she did it perfect."

Nobile said another factor in her success was the fact that she and the other cast members would play seven nights a week and then hit the stage at the CW's bar and "rock it" until the end of the night. You develop stamina when you worked that hard, he said.

After the tour the gang jumped back on the Tisdale bus, which was driven by retired elementary school principal Bob Reade, who once taught Shania's brother and they were being guided by Shania Twain Centre director Tracy Hautanen, who went to high school with the superstar.

In other words, they were in heaven. More people who know about Shania's upbringing.

It's going to be a great weekend ahead, says Tracy.

If you want to come up and take part, she has just one thing to say about that. Come on over. Or maybe that should be come on up.


http://torontosun.canoe.ca/News/Col...18/1177538.html


...wake up guys..! - you've got all winter to sleep - we want more pics & stories..!


John -

[Aqua436]

[AlanB]

Jamie actually joined us in Toronto for dinner at Arizona. Alas, he didn't come north with us for still more fun.

[AlanB]

The winners collect their prizes.

Keld collects his registration refund.



Irene collects her refund.



Steve receives his basket, now filled with goodies from the STC gift shop.



A young boy whose trip was sponsered by the Make A Wish foundation, receives a shirt personally autographed to him by Shania. Shania even wrote a small note on the shirt to him.

[cbspock]

Twain fans tour Timmins

By Scott Paradis
Local News - Friday, August 19, 2005 @ 07:00

A group of about 50 people toured through Timmins on Thursday trying to touch a little of what makes Shania Twain so special.

The visitors attending the Shania Twain Fan convention, which opened Thursday night at the Shania Twain Centre, toured the city viewing sights sometimes only loosely connected to Twain, all in the name of understanding where the artist came from and who she is.

Fans from the United States, England, Finland, Holland and across Canada sought a personal connection to their musical idol.


For Richard Wildbur, it was just as much about seeing the town Shania grew up in as it was seeing a country he’s never seen before.

“For the past six months I’ve been planning this,” he said. “I’m a big fan of her music and I figured it would be a nice way to visit Canada as well.”

For Earl Garman, from Maryland, it was about reliving the last convention. Garman said he’s been to two conventions, but has visited the city itself four times.

“I was here last year and it was then I decided to come here this time,” he said.

“I liked the convention. And I really like Timmins.”

Tour guide Tom Waller said many of the visitors, especially those from Europe, could have easily put their money towards a Shania concert.

But, he added, most of the people at the convention have been to more Twain performances than they can count. The convention is something more personal.

“They wanted to see the sites of the town,” he said. “They wanted to see where she came from and who she was before.

“They want to get closer to the home town of Shania Twain. They see something very special in Shania and they want to know what made her so special.”

Part of what made her so special, Waller added, was Timmins.

http://www.timminspress.com/webapp/sitepages/content.asp?contentid=122454&catname=Local+News&classif=News+%2D+Local

[Ren]

I'm currently backstage at the Shania Twain Center. First group of fans is doing the backstage tour. Aren't they lucky! Tracy is showing lots of cool stuff... unfortunately, we can't divulge those secrets here. It's all very top secret!
Ren

[Olga]

Wow, ,sure looks like a great convention so far........reading throught this thread, is the next best thing to actually being there in person.

Hope you're weather isn't as rainy and blah as Ottawa's right now.

Keep the posts coming, and have a great rest of your weekend and convention.

[Richard]

Well the Meet-n-Greet on Thursday evening was a fabulous success. We had a local young woman serenade our group with Shania music while we enjoyed conversations with each other, all the while sipping on our favorite beverages and nibbling on a variety of Cheese, Crackers and fruit.

Every fan mingled very well and there were alot of fun and enjoyable conversations as we got to know one another. Many fnas brought in their flags for the areas they live and addedthem to the flag display and there were many fans taking advantage of all the quality merchandise in the STC as the fans rang the sound of Ka-Ching at the cash registers.

Yes, the goofy guy in the clown suit was me.....hey what can I say...There is only one 2005 Shania Twain Fan Convention meet-n-greet and if it brought a few smiles and a bit of laughter into the event, then it was worth it.

After the mingling was well underway, Tracy suprized us with an announcement that she would be giving three groups an individual tour into the new exhibits and also explaining what were some of the comments and observations that Shania made to her when she visited the STC durnig the Homecoming last November. It was very interesting to hear about the kind of things that grabbed Shania's attention while she looked at the various displays.

Tracy had also set up a new display about the homecoming with pictures from that event and even included the sign I had made that Shania autographed.

One very funny moment came toward the end of the evening. While the final (third) group had finished their tour with Tracy but were in the theater watching the 12 minute video, Tracy came out to check on things near the STC front desk. It was getting kind of late and as I looked at my watch it was already 11:15pm. Knowing from a previous conversation I had with Tracy a few days earlier that JD Blair and Randall Waller were supposed to arrive at the airport at a little after 11:30pm, I said to Tracy,
"Ummmm.....Tracy? When are you supposed to pick up the boys?" Tracy looked over at me with a glazed look (...it had been a long day) and said, "What boys?" to which I replied to her "Ummmm...the boys at the airport." Upon which Tracy let out a few choice words not meant to be published here, grabbed her car keys and went racing to her car. She made it to the airport with just seconds to spare

[Richard]

It's Friday now and it's been a wonderful day so far. The morning started by Tracy taking three separate groups into the backstage area for a view of some of the recent wardrobe Items received from Shania. While one group was in with Tracy, the others were free to go back into the STC exhibits and look at them at a slower pace. A high light for me in the backstage tour was to see the "I Ain't No Quitter" wardrobe and having a chance to have my picture taken while wearing one of Shania's cowboy hats from that video.....(Ok so I wore two differnt cowboy hats from that video...but who's counting) Also an item thats not released into the store yet (so pictures were prohibited at this time) were samples of Shania's new perfume together with wardrobe from her photo shoot for the perfume promotion.

After which the fans joined in front of the STC for a group Photo. Tracy decided that she wanted the flag display in the photo, which was actually an appropriate thing because this convention has more delegates from more countries than ever before.

Thenit was off to one of three tours....The Gold Mine, Cedar Meadows or Millsons forestry. Then we all climbed into two busses that took us to teh MacIntyre arena where we had lunch, had out first glances of the Up! stage, saw some video from the homecoming and a highlight was to have two special guests join us for lunch. JD Blair and Randall Waller. They mingles with the crowd, took photos and signed autographs and carried on conversations with us. Talk about fun !!!!

Then it was off to Timmins High School where we saw Shania's favorite math classroom and then off to the auditorium for the Trivia contest finals. Two of the funniest moment were when Vanessa from Austria as not one of the five contenstants on the stand during a round but was so excited that she knew the answer that she blurted it out loud for the whole group to hear and the other had to do with the following trivia question: Name three of the Up! Tour Band Members. Allison was the first to ring in and her answers were:
JD Blair
Roddy Chiong
Cory Churko
Even though that was good enough for three correct answers, Randall Waller stood up with a comically hurt look on his face, walked up to the stage and escorted poor little embarrassed Allison away..... She was Red as a Beet and felt so silly for not naming Randall as one of the three.

Well, I need to leave the Timmins web and get back to the hotel to clean up now. I've got to get ready for this evenings events....Dinner, Trivia contest finals, Auction and Karaoke contest. Should be nothing but fun and well tell you all about it tomorrow.