The Calgary Stampede Showband makes nearly 200 appearances a year, and that’s the best proof we have that the Stampede is a music festival with a rodeo attached.
The Showband has been around since 1971. The Stampede’s own foundation page says it was created to be the musical ambassadors for the event.
Music was on the grounds before that. The Stampede’s Sam Centre history says that in 1964 the Stampede hired Randolph Avery to build a locally produced Grandstand show good enough to rival American state fair variety shows and even the Ed Sullivan Show.
His first group was the Calgary Kidettes, a singing and dancing troupe directed by Margot McDermott. By 1968 it had become the Young Canadians School of Performing Arts, which the Stampede says still performs in the Grandstand Show. That’s a long run.
What the Showband does
A lot. The Stampede Foundation says the band has more than 150 performers between 16 and 22 and makes nearly 200 appearances a year. It plays parades, concerts and competitive field shows, and some members form smaller groups, down to solo acts and rock bands.
The foundation lists the Sudler Shield from the John Philip Sousa Foundation and four appearances in the Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena. Not bad for a band of teenagers and young adults.
How the grounds filled up with stages
The Werklund Centre’s piece, The Greatest Music Festival on Earth, sketches the timeline. The Saddledome arrived in 1983, Nashville North opened in 1992, and by 2026 more than 100 concerts were scheduled across the grounds. It argues the Stampede may be the largest music festival in Canada by attendance.
The same piece says Nashville North was launched to protect the event’s country music heritage. Cowboys Casino opened the Cowboys Music Festival in 1999 with acts such as Barenaked Ladies, the Wild Horse Tent opened in 2009, and the Badlands tent brought electronic music programming in 2019.
Read in order, it’s a country event slowly making room for everything else, and we love watching it happen.
Who deserves the credit
Our pick is the Showband. A band of 16 to 22 year olds playing nearly 200 dates a year is a serious operation, and it deserves more credit than it gets at parade time.
Next time a Stampede parade goes by, find the Showband and listen.
A Pipe Organ Started Calgary’s Music Centre pairs nicely with this one, and Hoot Gibson and the Hollywood crew that crashed Stampede 1925 is close behind. Or try Hoot Gibson Rode Into Calgary and Made a Stampede Movie for a change of pace.
Keep going with The Edmonton Folk Music Festival Began as an Alberta Birthday Present and Mahler, a sprinkler leak and a very Calgary opening night.
Quick answers
The Calgary Stampede Showband makes nearly 200 appearances a year. The Stampede Foundation says it has been around since 1971, with more than 150 performers between 16 and 22, and plays parades, concerts and competitive field shows.
The Stampede Foundation lists the Sudler Shield from the John Philip Sousa Foundation and four appearances in the Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena. The Showband was created to be the musical ambassadors for the Calgary Stampede.
Nashville North opened in 1992, according to the Werklund Centre’s piece on the Stampede as a music festival. The same timeline says the Saddledome arrived in 1983, and that by 2026 more than 100 concerts were scheduled across the grounds.
