Canadian singer/songwriter Kathleen Edwards is pictured at a Toronto rehearsal studio on Tuesday January 12, 2012 as she promotes her new album Voyageur. The first time Edwards was shortlisted for the Polaris Music Prize back in 2008, she didn't know much about the award.Chris Young/The Canadian Press
An ornery wasp found a soft place to land, right on the arm of Kathleen Edwards. The singer-songwriter is recuperating after suffering an anaphylactic shock after being stung backstage after a performance Sunday at the Shores of Erie International Wine Festival in Windsor, Ont.
The incident, which required a trip to an emergency room, happened one day before it was revealed that the Hockey Skates singer had scored a nomination for this year's SOCAN Echo Songwriting Prize. The short-listed tune is the affecting A Soft Place to Land, off her buzzed-about album Voyageur.
Thanks to an epi-pen intervention, Edwards is okay. But she was unable to perform as scheduled on the first night of Festival Music House, an annual three-day TIFF-related shindig/concert which exposes Canadian tunesmiths to industry types and filmmakers looking for top-notch songs for their film scores.
On her Facebook page, Edwards said she had been "stuck several times" by a yellow jacket. "Bees and wasps are no longer welcome at my shows," she closed off her note. "Thanks, paramedics."
On her Twitter account, Edwards, ever the joker, noted that anaphylactic shock had ruined the "whole 10 handsome firemen and paramedics fussing over you moment," adding that she was "too busy dying to get a number."
Brad Wheeler