N.L.’s country music boom is sending line dancing and boot sales ‘off the charts’

Newfoundland and Labrador has quickly become one of the hottest country markets in the country.

Colleen Hann’s line dancing lessons in and around St. John’s, N.L. are high energy and high attendance — and filled with high cowboy boots.

What started with a once-a-week lesson a month ago has burst into a nearly full-time commitment for Hann, who has even travelled around the province to spread the love of country line dancing.

“It’s all ages, it’s from 8 to 80 and all walks of life,” she said before another session at The Old Mill, a bar in St. John’s.

“It just blew off the charts. I’m busy, busy, busy all the time, which is fantastic.”

Between her Tuesday classes at The Old Mill, her Monday classes at a West Side Charlie’s pool bar in the nearby town of Paradise, and a Thursday class at a new country-music themed bar in downtown St. John’s, Hann estimates she probably picks up about 350 clients a week.

That number has grown fast, perhaps double what she estimates she taught last year, and far above anything she could have expected when she returned to Newfoundland from Texas eight years ago.

“I felt like a proud parent when you finish a session,” she said. “I’ll stand back and I’ll look and I’ll just be so proud of how they’re doing and what I’ve created here in Newfoundland and Labrador.”

Hann’s classes are Newfoundland’s new country music fixation, distilled. It’s quickly become one of the hottest country markets in the country. Data from Spotify Canada suggests it’s the top region in the country for what the streaming giant calls “Canadian Country Music” streams from September 2024 to 2025.

Country hits have also become a staple in the province’s concert circuit: Shania Twain and Blake Shelton have both headlined at the Churchill Park Music Festival in St. John’s — those acts will be followed this year by headliners The Chicks and Keith Urban.

“The source material for American country music and the source material for Newfoundland traditional music are the same,” remarked Bob Hallett, former Great Big Sea singer and now head of the East Coast Music Association.

Hallett said country stars visiting Newfoundland and Labrador isn’t totally new — there was always interest for country music in the province, thanks in part to commercial radio which found receptive audiences in American military troops stationed at some of the United States bases in Newfoundland and Labrador.

“Country music guys like Johnny Cash were touring rural Newfoundland when no Canadian band was,” Hallett said.

But lately, a mix of the province’s sparse and spread-out population and its relatively remote geography have both encouraged music promoters to bet on country acts. There’s about 250,000 people within reasonable travelling distance for a concert, Hallett said, and you need a big draw to get enough of those people to make the show successful.

“You can’t just have men, or just women, it can’t be 18 to 25 or 35 to 60. You have to hit the broadest territory,” Hallet said. “And the kind of country music that promoters are talking about bringing here ticks a lot of boxes.”

You don’t have to be the biggest country fan to appreciate Shania Twain or The Chicks in concert — and those acts with broad appeal are creating a new type of country music interest in Newfoundland and Labrador.

“I’m not really a country music fan,” explained Valerie Flynn, one of Hann’s most loyal students. Flynn has been taking line dancing lessons for three years. “With all the great artists now that are popular country, she plays such a genre that you can get into the song.”

The have been some positive spin offs for other business in St. John’s, too — like First Western Boutique in downtown St. John’s.

“When you have these big festivals, people, as I mentioned, they want to have a good time and they want to be suitable, be dressed for the occasion,” said Ed Grace, a long-time employee of the store

“So yes, a big upsurge in the past several years.”