The St. John's Morning Show

The NL All Ages Weekend Tour is a showcase for young musicians across the province, and the experienced music educator and mentor Ben Chapman Smith is the driving force behind it. His mission is to guide the bands, and help them hone their sound and navigate the music biz. The CBC's Katherine Crummey dropped by a rehearsal recently, where the bands were getting ready for their big weekend tour.

St. John's Fashion Week is gearing up to be a picture-perfect event. Roger Maunder and Dave Howells, the directors and co-founders of the event, tell us what to expect in the coming days.

Chiyo the cat lives in Paradise, but she's quickly becoming an internet sensation, adding thousands of new Instagram followers every week. Chiyo joined us in the studio this morning, along with her owner Nicole Hall. 

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina resigned on Monday, after weeks of violent and deadly confrontations between student protestors, police and other authorities. The origin of those protests was a controversial job quota system, that gave priority to the children and grandchildren of those who fought in the Bangladesh Liberation War. Shafi Abrar is an engineering student at Memorial University, and a spokesperson for local Student Alliance for Bangladesh in Canada. He joined us in the studio today to discuss.

A few hockey stars have come to town for the Alex Newhook and Friends Charity Golf Classic. It starts today at Bally Haly golf course, and supports the Iris Kirby House, the Cancer Care Foundation and the REAL program. To kick off the event, a Fan Fest was hosted Monday night where fans could get up close and personal with their favourite players. The CBC’s Katherine Crummey stopped by the event to learn more.

A vigil was held in New Harbour Monday night, after 19 dogs were found dead last week, in the backyard of a home in the community. 52 year old Toby Cadotte was charged 19 counts of animal cruelty and one count of careless use of a firearm. It's unclear what actually happened to the dogs. Heather Ballard is the founder and director of Rescue NL, and she was at the vigil last night. We spoke to her over the phone this morning.

The Rust Bros are Mike Hall, Avery Shoaf, and Connor Charman-Hall. And their show Rust Valley Restorers is based in Tappen, BC - otherwise known as Rust Valley. Now, two of the rust brothers are coming to Newfoundland. The Morning Show's Sarah Antle caught up with Mike Hall and the show creator Matt Shewchuk, on the phone from Manitoba. At the time, they're cruising the highway in one of the cars they've restored. If you're familiar with the show, you might already know how this conversation went. 

The big fence separating St. John's Harbour from pedestrians has been a topic of debate on the the show this summer. We put out a call out for listener's ideas about how the harbour might be better arranged for everyone involved, and this call brought an interesting message all the way from Copenhagen. Patrick Handrigan is an architect, originally from St. John's. And he had some interesting thoughts about our connection to the ocean, and how that could be embraced on the harbourfront. 

Rowan is a strong little baby, and he has to be. Even before he was born, he was fighting for his life. He was born with a Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia. That's a rare condition - an opening in the diaphragm, which leads to organs developing in all the wrong places in the body. He's almost six months old now and he's home. Rowan's mothers are Stephanie Mercer and Tiffany Brazil, and we reached them at their home in South River, just outside Bay Roberts.

He didn't set out to run an independent business. He wanted to build a community where other passionate readers could chat about their favourite books and authors. Along the way, Josh Hutchings began his own book store called Collective Pulp. You'll find it online and at local markets. At its heart, it's still all about the best book you ever read, and finding the next best book you ever read. Josh Hutchings joined us over the line to chat about his passion for collecting and selling books.