Roper & Roper

Summer feel-good vibe music

In 1989 the Berlin Wall came tumbling down, the elder Bush had taken over the US presidency from a former movie star turned politician, and Brian Mulroney held the keys to 24 Sussex Drive. At a Dairy Queen in Anchorage, Alaska, lovebirds Skip Roper and Rhonda Civic (now Rhonda Civic-Roper) were tying the knot at their wedding ceremony. They had met a few years earlier on the set of a game show, and were immediately smitten with each other. They shared a love of pop music and were hooked on game shows, often travelling great distances to be in the audience, or—the pinnacle of desire— become a contestant. Who knows what brought them to Alaska from their home in sunny California. It could have been fate, or a quantum ripple in the fabric of space-time, or maybe they just took a wrong turn at Albuquerque. But the DQ in Alaska was the last thing they remembered until they were unpacked from a shipping crate delivered to My Pies in Wellington in 2021. They believe they may have been cryogenically frozen when they went in to get their ice-cream wedding cake from the freezer, and then ended up as an errant Amazon order to a small pie shop in an Ontario village. They weren’t too surprised that a NYC real estate tycoon had become US president, or that there was a Trudeau at 24 Sussex, but they were mystified by the Internet and, as Rhonda says, something called an ip-fone. But their faith in each other and their extensive repertoire of music from the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s gave them new purpose in life, and so was (re)born the musical duo of Roper & Roper.

“We play the feel-good songs from the sixties, seventies and eighties, and a little bit from the fifties, because those are our favourite songs,” says Rhonda, who demurely shuddered at the excesses of the ’90s musical scene. “The music that we play is summertime favourites. We want people to come out and see us and think of summer. We never play in the winter, only in the summer, and only in Prince Edward County.” Rhonda does the vocals and plays an electric ukulele, while Skip also does vocals and kazoo, as well as percussion with an empty can of No Frills pineapple juice. He says the acoustics are superior to other brands or varieties. The, ahem, oddities do not stop there. Their lights and amplifiers are solar powered, using a panel atop their converted Sprinter van, which is their summer residence and home to their cat and touring manager, Lord Nelson T. Snugglesworth III, who incidentally gets a 10 per cent cut of their earnings.

Roper & Roper, often dressed in matching velour tops, have a busy schedule this summer. They currently play on Sundays in Consecon, Tuesday evenings at The Eddie, Wednesdays at the Vic in Picton, and on Saturday evenings through the summer in Wellington Park. It’s a lively blend of music from their favourite decades, plus some Bahamian inspired tunes from their winter getaway. “We want to put smiles on faces. Wellington has that smalltown type of feeling, and that summer feeling that comes every year, and our music is trying to capture that. We want people to absorb some of the good vibes we are putting out,” says Rhonda. Roper & Roper say they have a hit single to be released on July 1, called Life’s Still Good, which can only be heard on County radio, 99.3 FM. Or, if you are lucky enough, you can hear it live. You can follow them on Instagram at roper_and_roper.