Minto Country Music Wall of Fame

Country music and Minto's Bob Cunningham go hand and hand. Bob was born in 1934 in Toronto and grew up listening to Big Band and RagTime music. That's the kind of music played by his father but a country concert by Hank Snow and Webb Pierce changed everything for Bob.

He started playing country music for three dollars a show. Bob spent some time playing rhythm guitar for one of the popular bands of the era called Johnny Burke and East Wind. In addition, he was a part of the warm up band at the Horseshoe Tavern when some of Nashville's biggest stars would come to town. After the tavern would close, Bob would hang out with Opry stars such as Jeannie Sheppard, Dave Dudley, Faron Young, Ray Price, Carl Smith and his favorite performer of the time, Webb Pierce.

Bob continued playing in the Toronto area until he and his wife Yvonne packed up and moved to Massachusetts. Bob played in the Boston area for two years before making the final move of his life to Minto, New Brunswick. There he played with the likes of Donnie Gould, Ronnie Vautour and later Gerry Martin and Oscar Egers. Cunningham says, "that era was filled with good tunes and plenty of laughs".

Bob experienced resurgence a couple of years ago when a Roy Payne song he recorded back in 1980 started to get airplay from KHJ. "I Wouldn't Take a Million Dollars for a Single Maple Leaf" struck a patriotic chord with KHJ listeners. You can still find Bob playing tunes at the kitchen tables in Minto and at Grand Lake. In his nearly fifty years of playing Bob says those kitchen table jams are the most fun because of the friendships he has made.

Bob and Yvonne live in Minto and have four children, Connie, Rhonda, Wayne, and Glen…. All of them have inherited Bob's love of music.