Joel Fafard capped off a banner year earning nominations for "Instrumental Album of the Year" at the Junos (Canadian "Grammy"), Canadian Folk Music Awards and the Western Canadian Music Awards for his recent CD, "…and another thing…", Winning the WCMA. Fafard is that rare breed of instrumentalist: the kind whose appeal reaches far beyond the realm of serious guitar enthusiasts. The gifted slide fingerstyle player writes stirring, melodic compositions that paint pictures as vivid as any song with words. He introduces them on-stage with hilarious commentary delivered in a "hillbilly farm-boy" stage persona that quickly wins his audience over. And when he sinks his chops into a number like "Face Down in the Rhubarb," well, let's just say the serious guitar enthusiasts aren't disappointed either. Many of Fafard's tunes have cryptic titles that figure heavily into his live show. Not content to simply show off his wizardry, Fafard proves himself the consummate entertainer, setting up the pieces with short stories that indicate the source of the title. "It's not that men aren't romantic," mutters Fafard, playing something of a redneck caricature of himself, "it's just that we are romantic about all the wrong things. …like hockey…and trucks…and barbeque." A few songs later, he intros "Mesquite Morning" by concluding that, seeing as he's such a romantic guy, it stands to reason that he'd write a love song to "a big hunk of red meat." The number of successful Canadian roots instrumentalists can probably be counted on one hand, but Joel Fafard is living proof of the old saying that if you do what you love, success will follow.