Over the weekend, hundreds of people from the Pontiac and beyond crowded the grounds at the Centre de Loisirs des Draveurs in Fort Coulonge for the town’s fourth annual country music festival.

Organized by local residents Phillipe Denault and Carole Faubert with help from various local sponsors, the event consisted of a four-day non-stop party featuring some of the best country music talents in the province.

Boasting around 30 prominent country musicians, including Francois Laliberté, Sylvie Rioux and Brian Mallery, participants donned their best cowboy outfits and had a blast grooving to the smooth sounds of country from sunrise to sundown.

But the most significant portion of the event was on Saturday when Denault and Faubert officially tied the knot on the main stage in front of a packed house leaving many audience members smiling with a few tears in their eyes. To help satisfy all the guests’ other needs, a wide variety of food and merchandise vendors, 50/50 draws and over 260 RV’s set up outside the arena.

Inside the arena, the main stage was set in front of hundreds of seats that filled up rapidly as soon as one of the bands got up to play.

For avid country festival goer Stephane Guimont, who travelled all the way from Lac St. Jean for this one, the atmosphere was unreal and he praised the Pontiac for it’s resident’s generosity and warm hospitality and the beauty of its landscape.

Close friends with the festival’s organizers Denault and Faubert as well as many of the featured musical acts, Guimont applauded volunteers for putting together such a well-run event.

“It’s really well-organized and the people are so nice,” he said. “It’s beautiful here, it’s crazy.”

As a country musician who’s performed in a variety of festivals throughout the country, Denault is grateful to be able to provide such a highly coveted event for music fans in the Pontiac.

“The lineup is so good,” he said. “It’s all professional artists from New-Brunswick, Ontario, Quebec and all over. The arena is turned into a spectacle area.”

Speaking on the event’s growth over the years, Denault noted that when the festival first started four years ago, there were only around 115 trailers set up. Now, with so many people attending, it finally provides an atmosphere that compares to the best music events around.

“The phrase of the weekend is ‘Phil Denault has brought Nashville to Fort Coulonge,” he said. “It’s incredible. It goes up every year.”

A tremendous attraction for outsiders and locals alike with nearly 1,000 people attending, the festival provided significant contributions to the local economy over the course of the weekend, Denault said.

“We have people going to the Coulonge Chutes,” he said. “All the hotels are full. Everybody gasses up before they leave. They’re spending between five and nine days in town so they’ve got to spend some money.”

All the proceeds from the event will go towards making next year’s festival bigger and better than the last, Denault said.

François Laliberté and his band rocked the stage on Saturday night at the third annual Fort Coulonge Country Festival.

Attendees mill about outside the arena in Fort Coulonge on June 1 in between sets. In total, the weekend brought out hundreds of country fans to camp and take in the music.

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