Fran Zankowski

Anne Murray—Canada's Barbra Streisand, the east coast's Joni Mitchell, one of the first inductees to the Casino Nova Scotia Music Hall of Fame—with her close personal friends from The Coast.

The casino just announced the very first members of the Casino Nova Scotia Music Hall of Fame. "These individuals are an excellent representation of the diversity of the music that represents Nova Scotia and Atlantic Canada culturally and historically," the casino's interim general manager Gary Moore says in the press release. "They have been amazing ambassadors for promoting and exporting our unique culture and history through music across the world for decades."

Five names make up the inaugural list of legends, and since we're talking about the biggest of the bigs here, you can probably guess some of them. You'll definitely recognize all of them. Going alphabetically by first name, the Hall of Fame inductees are Anne Murray, Brookes Diamond Productions (you could make the case that Brookes and Fiona Diamond, who run the ubiquitous production and management company, deserve to be named on their own, but that's quibbling), John Allan Cameron, Portia White and Rita MacNeil.

The hall itself is going to open at the Halifax casino this fall—watch for a gala party in October—with another site at the Sydney casino planned for 2016, and Music Nova Scotia will deal with details from governance (boring!) to curating memorabilia (awesome!). If anyone asks, we'll be happy to part with a treasure from The Coast's archives, the above photo of Anne Murray hanging out with Coasters Christine Oreskovich (left), Bethany Stout and me (right).