“Angel with a Lariat” is from the second of three albums from k.d. lang and The Reclines.
As far as not talking about “big” names goes I guess I’m pushing my rules once again. I found out about k.d. lang when she won a Juno Award in 1985 for Most Promising Female Artist and no one really knew much of anything of her, and certainly not outside of Canada. So I’m playing the “I knew her when” card. For me it wasn’t really until this 1987 album, Angel with a Lariat that I jumped on the chuckwagon so to speak. I guess for lack of a better term the producer of the album, Dave Edmunds was like a wellspring of music for me. Not only did he introduce me to old Blues, R&B and Rock and Roll songs, his association with artists such as k.d. lang, Shakin’ Stevens, The Fabulous Thunderbirds and The Stray Cats led directly to album purchases.
Beyond any connection with Edmunds, k.d. lang appealed to me with her take me as I am style and energy. She was a Patsy Cline devotee but got labelled as Cowpunk (Country Punk) with some of her early stuff as k.d. lang and The Reclines. It was a blend of mostly original songs mixed in with her take on covers of some great older Country Songs.
She first came to international recognition with this song.
“Crying” with Roy Orbison and k.d. lang was released in 1987. They won the 1988 Grammy Award for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals.
The award winning effort would peak at #28 on Billboards Adult Contemporary chart and #42 on the Country Hot 100. Following that k.d. lang released the album Absolute Torch and Twang with all but two original songs. It would garner her the Grammy Award for Best Female Country Vocal Performance. This once again was despite mediocre chart results for the album and the single “Full Moon of Love”. While it was a #1 in Canada, it only reached #22 on the Billboard Country Hot 100. Yet clearly the The Grammy Academy’s voting members saw some merit. I can’t say for certain but this may be the only time someone won for Best Female Country Vocal Performance and did not have a top ten single nor a song on the Year End Top 100 Country Chart in the US.
k.d. lang from a 1989 CBC TV special, The Buffalo Cafe (named after a famous Calgary eatery)
First recorded as “I Never Promised You a Rose Garden” by Billy Joe Royal in 1967, k.d. follows the lead from the Lynn Anderson #1 hit in 1970.
Lang would change gears with her 1992 album Ingénue and “Miss Chatelaine” would give her the third of four Grammy Awards, this time for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance. In Canada she has won six Juno awards, is a member of the Order of Canada and has a star on Canada’s Walk of Fame.
This the name I saved from a previous post, Tom was born in Saint John, New Brunswick and he and his single mother lived in abject poverty, at one point he was moved into the penitentiary to live with his mother. Shortly thereafter he was taken by Children’s Aid and placed in a broken foster home in Skinner Cove on Prince Edward Island. By age 13 he had enough and ran away to hitchhike across Canada. He spent the next 13 years doing odd jobs, writing songs and playing his guitar. He was 31 years old when he released his first Album. “Big Joe Mufferaw” was Toms first #1 on the Canadian Country chart. His songs were about Canada’s people and events. He had a remarkable style with his black Stetson hat and stomping foot. Seen as a novelty act by some but he was so much more than that to so many. A true Canadian storyteller and musical legend. There will never be another Stompin’ Tom.
I can’t think of a better song to end on than “My Stompin’ Grounds”
Today marks the end of National Indigenous History Month in Canada. As we will celebrate Canada’s 156th Birthday tomorrow, July 1, I wanted to talk a bit more about the music of our Indigenous Peoples. There have been some shocking revelations you no doubt would have heard in the news, several from the past few years, and the healing will take a long time. The wheels of the Federal Government’s commitment for reconciliation turn very, very slowly.
In Canada, the three indigenous populations are generally divided by First Nations, Inuit and Métis. I have included several members of these three groups already, but there is more to talk about. Collectively about 1.8 million identify their heritage from one of these groups.
First Nations
There are 50 First Nations in Canada in 630 communities from Coast to Coast to Coast, and the largest population of Indigenous People. Traditionally every society had their own song or songs. Instruments included various drums, clappers, rattles, flutes and several other improvised devices. When it comes to performers there are many of full or partial heritage that have had success in the mainstream genre.
The Band’s Robbie Robertson was from Toronto but his mother was Cayuga and Mohawk and grew up on the Six Nations Reserve in Ontario. I mentioned a few more names this month such as Shane Yellowbird. But I wanted to present just a few more, after all the first step is just to listen.
Northern Cree
They are from Maskwacis which is near Edmonton, Alberta. While they have not won, they have been nominated for nine Grammys in three different categories. In 2017 they performed at the Grammy Awards Ceremony. They have one nomination and one win (somewhat oddly) in the category for Classical Album of the Year-Large Ensemble at the Juno Awards. If you wanted to hear some incredible Pow-wow singing, storytelling and artistry you can’t do much better.
Logan Staats
He was born on the Six Nations Reserve, but grew up in the nearby City of Brantford Ontario. I had the opportunity to hear Logan when he opened for Buffy Sainte-Marie. I had not heard of him before but I was certainly impressed with his talent.
Willie Dunn
Willie (1941-August 5, 2013) was born in Montreal, but it is his heritage from the East Coast Mi’kmaq People that guided his music and message. He had such a classic Folk singer voice, in this song comparable to Bruce Cockburn.
Inuit
As I mentioned in an earlier post, if you are an Inuk, then typically you are one of the inhabitants of the Artic and Subarctic regions. The names there I’ve talked about were Susan Aglukark and Tanya Tagaq. I’m happy to add one more name, Elisapie (Isaac). Elisapie is from Salluit, Nunavik which is, I neglected to mention in my other post, on the Northeast tip of, and also part of the Province of Quebec.
Métis
Geographically the Métis have traditionally lived in the Northern Territories, all of four of Canada’s most western Provinces as well as Northern Parts of the American West. There are populations elsewhere to the East such as Northern Ontario and Quebec. I mentioned Tom Jackson earlier in our trip across Canada and he is of Métis heritage.
I have to say the only reason I recognized the name of Amanda Rhéaume among a list of Métis singers is because of her father, Eugène Rhéaume. He was from The Northwest Territories and was the first Member (elected) of Canada’s Parliament that was of Métis heritage. As her father was based in Ottawa, that’s where she was born. I gave her a listen, I am glad I found her, she has a beautiful voice.
Note
This is the last post in this Journey across Canada. Tomorrow, July 1 I will also not surprisingly feature a Canadian singer. Perhaps in relief to my subscribers, the once daily posting will come to an end. Thank you to all who read and especially to those who took the time to click on the links and have a listen. To those who commented, I appreciate the feedback and the sharing of your thoughts. And with some of you, there were memories brought about by my discussing just a small bit of the great musical talent of Canada. I don’t mind saying it has been a lot of work but it’s also been fun for me to reminisce a bit myself and to find some new voices as well. Thank you and Happy listening!
This is the penultimate post for the Canada month of June and then a short post will appear on July 1 to mark Canada Day. I have for the most part kept to popular culture for the music I presented. A lot of it from personal experience and I tried to paint with a fairly wide brush, too much Country for some I’d imagine but it’s one of my favorite genre.
I just want to remind you that I tried to steer clear of the big names, so no Rush or Bryan Adams for example, he is a superstar, he has sold about 100 million records and was not on my list because he is just too famous, not that he isn’t blog worthy. There are still so many names that I have not mentioned, and genre I have not discussed.
Dave is music writer from A Sound Day and host of Turntable Talk, is from Canada so he has been the most active in adding some good names in the comments section of several posts, so they are in my notes for the future. I put a good dent into Canadian music but I could post everyday for another year and not run out of quality names.
So it’s not possible to list everyone from Canada, after all I plan to continue to write and as I always, I have included artists from around the world. A Canadian Author and much more Leon Stevens also blogs on Canadian music quite often and well worth checking out. Leon did me the courtesy of a link to my post yesterday on his site.
As for my writing, I am aware that there is a vibrant Hip Hop and R&B scene in Canada. Drake and the Weeknd are just two examples of music I know nothing about. Deadmau5 is from Niagara Falls and is an Electronic Music superstar, apparently? So nothing on those topics and you can read about them in a million other places.
I barely touched on up and coming artists or the Indie scene. While I did cover some guitar players, you mostly heard about the singers. If I also go behind the microphone a bit, adding musicians and music technicians I would have enough names that I could go on years. Not to test your patience, or maybe I am, but here are just a few more names, but I’m still saving some good ones!
Oscar Peterson is someone I have referenced in past posts and there is likely a future one dedicated solely to him. He was born and grew up in Montreal, and won a CBC radio contest at age 14. He then dropped out of high school to pursue a music career full time and the rest as they say, is history. Peterson is one of the best Jazz Pianists to have ever played. That’s eight Grammy’s talking and the legendary Duke Ellington had high praise calling him “the Maharaja of the keyboard”. Maharaja meaning something like Great King or Great Ruler.
Percy Faith was born and raised in Toronto and became known as many things, a conductor and bandleader, an orchestrator and a composer. His first Billboard #1 hit was a version of “It’s April Again’ and also known as the “The Song From Moulin Rouge”. Accompanying his Orchestra on vocals was American Felicia Sanders and the song was on the charts for 24 weeks, ten of them at #1 and it was the top song of 1953. He would do the same thing with the instrumental, “Theme from A Summer Place” it spent nine weeks at #1, setting a record that was not broken for 17 years. It was also the #1 song for 1960. His version of “Delicado” had also hit #1 in 1952, he would post over two dozen charted songs.
Loreena McKennitt was born and raised in Morden, Manitoba and always loved music but attended The University of Manitoba to become a Veterinarian. While in Winnipeg she became enamored with the vibrant music scene. As I mentioned before this is where Burton Cummings and Randy Bachman and The Guess Who and BTO are from, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young and Lenny Breau among many others launched their career’s in Winnipeg.
She turned from Folk to Celtic music and went to Ireland to study. In 1981 joined the Stratford Festival Acting Company. She has released 10 Studio Albums, all under her own record label, Quinlan Road and has sold over 14 million records. She is, if you listen, a remarkably talented vocalist and plays piano, harp and accordion as we as other instruments. The clip below is called “The Mummers’ Dance” from 1997.
There is a lot of stuff to read and listen to, so I really do appreciate it when people take the time to follow my blog. I have mentioned in this series, a few of the bloggers that I follow. Most I would say I follow because of the music they write about and many have become friends and we have some great exchanges.
I want to acknowledge the support from the WordPress blogging community, I mentioned Max and Lisa in earlier posts. Christian from Christian’s Music Musings has taken interest lately in Canadian artists and I am thankful for that, he writes a great blog. North is an expat now in LA posting some interesting thoughts and some covers I would never have heard of at Spinning Three Ways. I follow John who posts on music daily and has a some deep knowledge related to we in the older crowd, you can find him at The Sound of One Hand Typing.
You should check out Eclectic Music Lover for some more current and Indie stuff, and some Canadian artists in there as well. Check out deKE for some serious metal knowledge, album reviews and a YouTube broadcast. I apologize as I can’t list everyone I follow but I have some good exchanges with Zack at The Musical Divide, and Keith as the Nostalgicitalian and then there is the self described “touch of whimsy” that is Obverse.
Helen was born (1913) and raised in Toronto and as she was growing up she became a lover of Jazz music. It seems almost unbelievable that a young woman from Toronto growing up in the 1920’s would end up accomplishing the things she did. While she had aspirations to become a singer her musical abilities would take her to Okeh Records, a New York label noted for recording Black artists in the early days of Jazz as they were formed in 1918. Helen worked on many recordings in the 1930’s and most significantly she was Duke Ellington’s Producer on almost all of his small band recordings called Small Groups. They were released under the names of his sidemen such as Cootie Williams and Johnny Hodges.
During WWII she left music and joined the the Women’s Army Corps and spent time working in Secret Operations. She organized for her church and was a noted Civil Rights Activist. Helen was a regular contributor to the Jazz publication Downbeat Magazine. She was also the co-organizer for the famed Benny Goodman’s, Carnegie Hall concert in January 1938. This was the first Jazz concert ever held at Carnegie Hall. Count Basie would follow in December of 1938 with the first all Black concert.
Helen Oakley Dance is the author of the first and definitive biography on Blues Guitar Legend, T. Bone Walker. Stormy Monday: The T-Bone Walker Story was published in 1987. She was quite the individual.
Jenna Andrews
Jenna was born and raised in Calgary and showed signs of her musical ability by playing piano at age 5, by 14 she was writing songs. She was heavily involved in music in high school, she would eventually move to Vancouver where she was discovered by Nelly Furtado’s Manager Chris Smith. She released her first single “Tumblin’ Down” in 2010 and it hit #27 on the US R&B Chart.
While having success as a recording artist, she had decided to pursue her passion for writing, publishing and producing. She works on Artist Development as well, coaching Noah Cyrus, Stella Ward and others. As a co-writer her song credits include; Majid Jordan, Banks, NCT 127, BTS, Jennifer Lopez, Dixie, Le Sserafim and Drake. As a Producer or Vocal Producer she has worked with many of the same names as well as The Band Perry and Little Mix.
She worked with BTS on their Grammy nominated song “Dynamite” as well as “Butter” as a co-writer. Both song were #1 hits. Andrews worked with Ed Sheeran on “Permission to Dance” also a #1 smash hit for BTS. On top of this she continues to record but her ability to mentor young artists and work in all areas of writing and production puts her in high demand.
More Producers
Dalbello. I am getting lazy so I just copied this on Lisa Dalbello from Wikipedia “Dalbello has not released another album since 1996 and has primarily focused on producing and writing for other artists such as Heart, Julian Lennon, Nena, and Patti LaBelle, whom she also produced. Some of the artists and writers she has co-written with are her friends Bryan Adams, Julian Lennon and Ann and Nancy Wilson of Heart, as well as David Foster, Carole Bayer-Sager, Holly Knight, Chaka Khan, Branford Marsalis, Damhnait Doyle and Dan Hill”.
WondaGurl was a producer on one of Rhianna’s top songs for 2015 “Bitch Better Have My Money.”
Hill Kourkoutis was a producer, engineer and soundmixer for artists I have mentioned in some of my posts this month such as Amanda Rheaume, Serena Ryder and Jill Barber. She also worked on the album Marthology: In and Outtakes from Martha and The Muffins.
Miriam Linna was born in Sudbury in 1955 and her family would move to Cleveland when she was 12. After a lot of hard work as a drummer she was one of the founding members of The Cramps. Her drumming ability was once recognized by Bob Dylan. She and her late husband Billy Miller started Norton Records in New York City. Miriam still operates the label that has produced a number of Rockabilly artists such as the legendary Link Wray and Gene Vincent. The label has been recognized for work on a number re-releases of classic Rock and Roll artists such as Carl Perkins and Bobby Fuller.
David Foster
David was raised in Victoria, British Columbia. He was born in 1949 and to say he was a child prodigy sounds like one of those platitudes we toss around perhaps too often. How about this, he enrolled in the Music Program at The University of Washington at age 13. As a keyboard player he backed Ronnie Hawkins and then in 1966, still just 17 years old he joined Chuck Berry’s band and played with Bo Didley. He moved to LA with his band Skylark who had a #1 hit with “Wildflower” in Canada and #9 on Billboard Hot 100 in 1973.
He worked with George Harrison and Ringo Starr, and he won his first Grammy in 1980 for co-writing “After The Love Is Gone” by Earth, Wind and Fire. It would take me all day to list his song writing credits and how big the hits were for the artists he worked with as a writer and arranger. He began writing film scores and one of his first songs “St. Elmo’s Fire (Man in Motion)” was a #1 hit in 1985. And on and on we can go for his movie work, including The Body Guard as Producer on “I Will Always Love You” by Whitney Houston.
He began as a credited Producer with singer Jaye P. Morgan in the 1970’s, and after that, we once again have a list too long. Just a few of the names include Dolly Parton, Rod Stewart, Alice Cooper and Hall & Oates in the 1970’s to the 1980’s with Aretha Franklin, Glen Campbell and Boz Scaggs. He co-wrote that great song “Look What You’ve Done To Me“. Also in the 80’s he worked with The Tubes, he co-wrote songs and produced Chicago’s album Chicago 16 and Chicago 17 & 18. In the 90’s more writing and producing with names like Barbra Streisand and he started working with Celine Dion. He would Produce “The Power of Love” which was the #1 selling single by a female artist in 1994. He worked on many songs with her over the years, including another worldwide smash written by Diane Warren, “Because You Loved Me” for which she won a Grammy Award. The record sold over two million copies in the US alone. Not that he wasn’t working with amazing talent but it seemed everything he touched turned to gold.
The next decade his torrid pace continued with Mariah Carey, Michael Bublé, Josh Groban, Andrea Bocelli and he Produced Seal’s album Soul from 2008. On to the next decade and more of the same and many hits, and a Christmas Album with Mary J. Blige, albums for Diana Krall and Bryan Adams. You will find he has keyboard and had several vocal credits on much of this work as well.
He has won 16 Grammy Awards with 47 nominations, placing him fourth on the all-time list. He has a Golden Globe and he has won 7 Juno Awards with 27 nominations. Foster is a recording artist as well with eight albums. There are very few in the industry with more wins and nominations in more categories such as Producer of The Year, to Album of the Year and Best Original Song.
Jack Richardson
Jack was born in Toronto in 1929 and he died in 2011 at age 81. He mortgaged his home to pay for his production of the Guess Who album Wheatfield Soul released in 1969. The album was a success reaching #3 in Canada and #45 on The Billboard Top 200. The single “These Eyes” was top 10 in Canada and the US. He continued to work with them on Canned Wheat and American Woman. The lead single “American Woman” would hit #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was a worldwide hit song in 1970. The B side of that single was the medley of ‘No Sugar Tonight/New Mother Nature” which also charted #1 for three weeks.
Richardson also produced Bob Seger’s Night Moves album, Alice Cooper’s break through album Love It to Death and also albums for Max Webster, Kim Mitchell, Poco and Badfinger. In total at least three dozen albums. He also produced The Irish Rovers television show. I have mentioned this in posts before but the Music Industry Arts (MIA) program at Fanshawe College in London, Ontario benefited greatly from his tenure as an advisor and eventually a Professor in the 1980’s.
Daniel Lanois
Daniel was born in Quebec in 1951, but grew up in Hamilton, Ontario. As many Producers do his career stared as a musician, he his a multi instrumentalist and is still performing and making new music. He began to work with Brian Eno on some of his projects which led to co production of U2’s album The Unforgettable Fire and The Joshua Tree which would win Grammys for Best Rock Performance and Best Album. He produced Bob Dylan’s Oh Mercy and the Grammy Award winning Time Out of Mind in 1997.
He produced Emmylou Harris’s album Wrecking Ball and it won a Grammy in 1996. He produced Willie Nelsons album Teatro in 1998. He would win one of his seven Grammys for Neil Youngs song “Angry World” in 2010. Quite the stellar career and he has worked with dozens of other artists and still managed to make 8 solo albums. He is coming to the Music Hall in London, Ontario on July 19, 2023.
Canada has a number of producers including Mustafa and Murda Beatz working with some of the leading Hip Hop and R&B Artists such as Drake, Ariana Grande, Nicki Minaj, Cardi B, Chance The Rapper and Lil Wayne.
Torontonian Frank Dukes has produced some of the best artists in the business his first production win for a Grammy Award was with Eminem in 2015 The Marshall Mathers LP 2. Following that he won Grammys with The Weeknd, Cardi B and Motomami (Rosalía). He produced three tracks on Taylor Swifts Grammy nominated album Lover in 2020. Dukes has two Latin Grammys and literally dozens of other awards. Now 39, at age 38 he retired from producing to focus on his own recording career.
There are many more names to discuss but I think you have some idea that Canadians are in the mix with some of the top artists in music and providing some great success.
Note
Tomorrow is the Wrap Up and then a final post to end the ‘Canada’ month of June. There will be a short but I think special post on July 1.
Mostly Music Covers 