Singular Sensation: Dan the One Man Band

As a wisecracking street busker, Dan Duguay had been to every big city in Canada when he rolled into Calgary 15 years ago to perform. He didn’t expect much from the city, but as he wrapped up his show on Stephen Avenue, he was quickly taken aback by the number of strangers who asked him if he needed a couch to crash on.

“I had been all across Canada, and not once had anyone ever asked if I needed a place to stay,” he recalls. “I remember thinking, ‘This place is cool.’”

Since then, Duguay — a.k.a. Dan the One Man Band — has become a staple act at festivals and events throughout Calgary. He can be seen at the Calgary Farmers’ Market, where he often busks to test out new material. And he’s worked at festivals as far away as Africa, New Zealand, Vietnam, Scotland, Australia and Japan.

“I provide on-beat music with offbeat humour,” he says of the act where he plays a drum strapped to his back with his feet, while simultaneously strumming a guitar and banging out melodies on everything from a harmonica to a kazoo.

The show, which normally runs for 45 minutes, always brings in the audience. “I’ll work the crowd, and get them to pat their heads and rub their stomachs to see if they’ve got the dexterity and coordination to be a one-man band,” he says.

Onlookers can also expect Duguay’s offhand jokes on the trials and tribulations of being in the band. “You know, stuff about the drummer being a heel, and me not being able to get him off my back, or that the band has been able to stay together so long because we are so close,” he says.

Getting a chuckle out of a crowd has always been easy for Duguay. As a kid, he was the class clown. “I’d try to get better marks by making the teacher laugh,” he says.

Duguay started off playing the guitar as a street performer in his early 20s in Ottawa. After a few months, he decided to expand the act into a one-man band to make more money. “People notice you when you have a drum strapped to your back,” he jokes. He took his show onto the road and headed west in the 1990s, after the street-performance scene in Ontario fell flat due to an economic slowdown. After travelling and performing throughout the world, he set up roots in Calgary in 1995.

This month marks Duguay’s 20th anniversary as a one-man band. And while he admits it’s not the type of job you’d expect someone who has a wife, a house, two kids and two cars to have, he says it’s something he wouldn’t want to change.

“A lot of people come up to me and say, ‘Man, that’s got to be a hard way to make a living,’ but I walk through life every day and see jobs that make my job look easy,” he says.

Looking to the future, Duguay plans to do less busking and more paid gigs, such as putting on shows at fairs, corporate events and tradeshows.

“To be able to do this for a living and make a go of it is a very special thing,” he says.

For more information on Dan the One Man Band, go to dantheonemanband.com