If you ever get the urge to play and sing in front of people, there are plenty of opportunities sprinkled throughout the week at various open mics in Lethbridge.
Several popular new open mic nights have started. The Onion hosts a popular Monday night open mic. And there are regular Tuesday night open mics at the Slice 
and Mondays and Wednesday open mics at the Owl Acoustic Lounge when they don’t have bands playing, plus a Saturday night jam at the Smokehouse and the Lethbridge Folk Club open mic, which is now on the last Friday of every month at Casa. The Smokehouse Saturday night jams will be taking a break for the summer as of June 4.
A couple of of the more popular open mics are on Saturday afternoons.
The Lethbridge Public Library Family jam has been happening at the Owl Acoustic Lounge for a couple of summers, but it closes down for the summer on May 21.
“We run from October to May because it is difficult to get people out. Most kids are away or at camp during the summer,” said organizer John Greenshields. He said while most of the participants in the family jam are under 18, sometimes accompanied by their parents, they have also had prominent faces on Lethbridge’s music scene come out and play including James Oldenburg, Leeroy Stagger and some of his bandmates.
“We usually have their family in the audience so it is usually a very enthusiastic and supportive crowd,” he said.
Greenshields is looking for a few donations for the family jams including a guitar and keyboard which will be stored with the other equipment at the Owl Acoustic Lounge.
One of eight different hosts host the afternoon jam running from 3:30 to 7 p.m. and often later due to its popularity.
“It’s a different host every week, so there is different types of music. When Andy MacNamara hosts, he’s from the Maritimes, so he plays a lot of traditional music,” said open mic regular Frank Gutjahr, whose blues -rock band Driving While Blind hosted April 23.
“They usually go until 7:30. One time we were playing so late, they had to end it because of a private party,” he said.
“I love music and we thought doing open mics would bring in business,” said Honker’s music/ entertainment co-ordinator Samantha Wright, praising owner / operator Vicky Vanden Hoek for opening the doors to the many musicians who want to spend a pleasant afternoon playing music.
“She does like to support local music,” she continued.
“There are a lot of great musicians here, so we thought we’d open our doors to them,” Wright said.
“It’s a different breed of people who come here,” she said, adding as of May, open mics will be Friday nights as well as Saturday afternoons.
“We have people who come here every week, she added, noting a lot of the musicians and patrons tend to be more mature.
“Me and my husband live right around the corner from here,” said regular Laurie Wintoniak, who has been to every one of the open mics since they started.
“Music soothes the soul,” she said adding the afternoon start time is ideal for the couple
Drummer Raz Bruce, who along with many of the Honker’s musicians sometimes perform at the Smokehouse Saturday night open jams, which are taking a break for the summer, regularly performs at the Honker’s open mic .
“It’s fantastic. There are a lot of great people here and a lot of great musicians,” Bruce said.
“I love playing. It’s something I just need to do,” he said.
