This site was put together in love for my incredible mother with hum I completely adore.
I have put this page together as a way to get her talent seen outside of this community. Simone is paired with a great bunch of talented gentlemen. This list most recently includes band member of “Big Bad Blueâ€, Cliff Maddix, Steve Wilson and Randy Leach.
For the rest of this page I want to share a bit of Simone’s life story in hopes that you too may feel as close to this beautiful soul as I do. I feel privileged to share with you her amazing talents thought this medium.
Join our friends list and keep your eye on this girl, she is a shining star and is on her way to the top!
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Welcome to the Official Fan Site for Simone Varey.
As her Daughter and biggest fan I have watched her grow and develop as a musician over the years. For as long as I can remember Simone has been a musician. Music has always been a staple in our house filling our home and lives with joy and love.
In the beginning
Simone grew up in Winnipeg Manitoba with two sisters. As a young girl her passions where swimming and learning the Hebrew language. She grew up in a family that did not take their heritage as seriously as most. She was not forced to go to Synagogue nor was she given a batmitsfa. She was how ever given the opportunity to go to Hebrew school which would later fuel her desire to take a bachulaors degree in linguistics. She, (just as all the woman in her family did) took the piano, her first instrument. Her musical influences as she was growing up where more on the classical side. It has only been in the last 10 years that she has explored the music of her genre and the last 5 years that the blues has taken over her life. At 18 she came half way across Canada to Hope BC where she lived selling roses on the road side. There she had her first child, a daughter she named Aviva. With in two years she found her self back in Winnipeg where she married a Mormon man and began her journey as a wife and mother.
The lost years
During the 15 years she spent as a Mormon she dedicated her life to family. Since music was always in her blood she easily fell in to the position of conducting the choir. I remember how happy she was during the hours when we would sing those beautiful songs. She was a very loving mother and spent much of her time learning new life skills. She had always been survival of the fittest and soon was asked to be the nurse of the girl’s camp. Those summers of song and friendship filled her with a sense of accomplishment and joy. She still speaks of those times, (this may have been around the time that she became a story teller). When she was not at the camps there was always the festivals, (children’s festivals) where and still are the highlight of her summers.
She learned a lot about wool and knitting as her and her sister younger sister Diana learned this amazing art. She was also a seamstress. I remember spending hours in Fanny Fabrics picking out patters and working on projects. She also loves animals. At one point she raised and groomed dogs. After seeing best in show I’m glad she did not choose this as her life direction. She did how ever decide one year to raise rabbits for food, until she realized that her husband could not stand the sight of blood. This was a short lived project and did not last for more than a couple years. Since music was to play such a big part in her later life it was no surprise that Diana and her would spend hours together making music. Diana learned the stand up base while Simone took on the banjo, piano, flute and at one point the mandolin. But the amazing discovery was when she taught her self how to play the Celtic Harp.
Severn years after her first child was born she had her first son Ari. She had undergone several surgeries to be able to become pregnant again. As with her first child she strongly believed in natural child birth. After Ari was born it was natural for her with her skills to become a midwife. These years where hard on her mirage and church piers did not agree with her choice of career directions. Two years later her second son Yehudi was born. Shortly after that she went to Al Paso Texas to become an accredited mid wife. This time where an amazing growing experience for her and she got to learn yet another language. On one of her trips home she became pregnant with her third and final son Zachary. When she returned home to have Zachary there was a no doubt that her marriage was coming to an end.
The Shift
After the separation and divorce she decided to get excommunicated form the church and follow her passions. This was a difficult time for her for now she was a single mother of 4 children. She took her life into her own hands and as the strong confidant woman that she is she decided to go back to school and earn her Bachelor of Arts. She studied at the University of Manitoba.
By this time I was now 18 and decided to find my father and started my journey half way across Canada to British Columbia. Because of our strong bond as mother and daughter I could not live with out Simone closer to me. So In 1995 Simone and I moved her and her three young sons to the beautiful heritage town in the heart of the kootenays called Nelson, BC. This is where her music and acting Career really blossoms. In 1997 Simone called me up and declared that she wanted to follow her dream of being a gypsy and that she always found puppets, (marionettes) to be fascinating. That year I picked out two small martinets and sent those to her with a card that simply said “follow your dreamsâ€. That was the birth of The “Visions Alive Puppet Troopâ€.
As you may well have guessed by now acting and story telling are also great passions of hers. She soon became a recurring face in the Nelson Capitol Theater. Over the winter months she played Christmas carols on the harp and in the summer she toured with her family of puppets to festivals across Canada. She got involved in education and was the administrator for Nelsons Chinese Medical School. From there she got involved with the Art community and worked with a few of the art schools in Nelson, including but not limited to the Nelson Fine Arts center.
Since knighting was in her soul she has recently taken up knighting with an antique sock knighting machine. She sells her wears mostly at craft fairs. Although we are trying to get her up on eBay LOL. She has also been known to make custom puppets on special order.
It was in 2001 she was introduced to a slide guitar. This was the fuel for her move in the direction of blues and jazz. In 2003 She asked to join her first band called White lightning. This was the real begging of her paid career as a blues, jazz vocalist as they began playing all over town. She quickly got noticed as being an incredibly talented singer, taking gigs all over in the interior of BC. Around the same time she kept up with her puppets and joined other vocalists in trios such as Full Swing and Troika.
Her career really took of when she met Cliff Maddix. They started off playing as a duo in a local lounges. In 2006 she began realized that her vision of playing on the stages of the world would not happen with White lightning. She left the group and formed the band “Big Bad Blue†with Cliff Maddix, Steve Wilson and Randy Leach. This was a jump in status and together they began to realize they had hit on a winning combination.
In August 2007 Big Bad Blue had been asked to play the Kaslo Jazz Fest. Shortly after that Simone and Cliff opened for Duke Robolar at one of the local night clubs. As she grows as an artist she also grows as a human being. This incredible woman not only shares her true passion with the world but becomes more and more popular across the country. This myspace is a work in progress and will be updated on a regular basses.
Feel Free to Google Simone Varey. Putting quotations around her name will help to narrow your search.
Click here to access Google in a new browser
To book Big Bad Blue Please visit their website at
http://www.musicopolism.com
To learn more about Visions Alive Puppets visit
http://www.marionettes.ca
To see video of Simone visit
http://www.youtube.com Again search Simone Varey.
To learn more about beautiful Nelson BC visit
www.discovernelson.com/htdocs/main.html
www.city.nelson.bc.ca
www.nelsonbc.ca