Leon Redbone signed my uke

You read that right: Leon Redbone signed my ukulele.

This happened on Monday night at Hugh's Room, after a tremendous show - among the best I've ever seen there, and I've seen a good many.



I had done an interview with Leon Redbone for Rootsmusic.ca earlier in the evening, so perhaps we had a bit of a rapport.

He'd given me some pretty good advice about bringing the whimsy back to my work.

But for the life of me, I can't figure out what the hell he wrote on my uke!

The Voice of Gord

For seven winters now, I've had the honour and the privilege of hosting The Way We Feel, a continuing tribute to the life, the work, the art and the voice of Gordon Lightfoot.

I've written about it a number of times in this space, trying to capture what it's meant to join voices with musicians and performers from across the country, in an effort to echo the voice of Gord.

We've never seen ourselves as parrots or puppets, but as practitioners of a living tradition. And in practicing, we've come to hear the voice of Gord more closely, and in different ways. It's not the voice of a radio hit anymore, or the voice that wafts from the familiar grooves of an old vinyl record. It's the voice of a landscape, a geographic and emotional space that only seems to get wider and more mysterious the more we explore it.

We started singing because it was about time. In 2002, when Aengus Finnan and Jory Nash booked the first show, no one had made the effort to do a Lightfoot tribute show yet. I suppose people had thought since the voice of Gord had been there for all our lives, surely he'd be singing forever. But when Mr. Lightfoot got sick and his own voice was literally silenced by an abdominal hemorrhage, the silence would not stand. People began to sing along. By the time he was back out of bed and on tour again where he belongs, many voices had joined his own in a Canadian chorus.

The chorus has been building into a grand crescendo. Last fall, I helped put together a project to celebrate Gordon Lightfoot's 70th birthday online at Canoe.ca/lightfoot. When we gave fans the opportunity to share their wishes, they came in by the hundreds, not just from fans, but from peers as well. Everyone from Anne Murray to Tom Cochrane to Dan Hill to Kris Kristofferson had been touched by hearing the voice of Gord.

Over the years Mr. Lightfoot has quietly, modestly, graciously acknowledged the accolades and the adulation. A few times, he's slipped in the back door of Hugh's Room to listen to The Way We Feel for a bit, to shake hands and thank the many musicians who have clamoured to sing his praises. Once - I think it was year 3 - he even hopped on stage to say a few words, to the delight of all.

But he's never taken the stage to sing before. Until last night, when, amid deafening applause, Gordon Lightfoot hopped up on stage in sneakers and blue jeans, a borrowed guitar in his hands. His face was golden in the light, his skin nearly translucent.

Hugh's Room hushed as he approached the mic. With a CBC Radio truck parked right outside on the street, the whole country was on the line. Everyone was listening, intent, as his fingers graced the strings with a brave and tender version of the aptly-chosen "Song For A Winter's Night.'

From a thin and restless wanderer, unweary from his travels and unbent from his travails came an unmistakable, irreplaceable sound...

It was the voice of Gord!

Why is this man smiling?

Working on this site requires me to spend a lot of time looking at pictures of myself. Understanding how I present myself to the world is part of what I do. I also talk about myself a lot; this is a diary, after all. As someone who is hoping one day to transcend the ego, I feel a certain tension about all this mirror- and navel-gazing. I'm also frequently chagrined by how much clutter I discover in the ongoing effort to clean up the dirty basement of my soul. But what makes it all worth while is that occasionally, I discover something in me that I really like.

Last summer, I saw a photograph of myself taken during the encore of my CD release at Hugh's Room. I was smiling so broadly I barely believed it was me when saw the picture (although the music note ball cap and Canadian flag t-shirt were pretty good evidence). I truly hadn't realized that my mouth could even stretch that wide. My face actually taught my brain a lesson.

Later, I saw another picture of me, taken in the backstage area at the Shelter Valley Folk Festival. My eyes were closed and I was listening to the live feed from the stage, captured brilliantly by my friend Michael Nunan. The look on my face in the picture was one of profound peace. I truly hadn't realized that my mind could even sit that still. Knowing that I was able to inhabit a friendly moment incidentally, gave me more confidence to inhabit difficult moments intentionally. That was a big step.

Recently, I saw a likeness of me with a big wide grin and an easy, happy confidence on stage at the Free Times Cafe. That picture somehow combined the peace of the Shelter Valley shot and the joy of the Hugh's Room shot. Again I was greatful for the gift of a photographic lesson. Why is this man smiling, I wondered?

He's smiling because he's happy.

Of course that opens another can of worms: who am I to be happy? I'm an undeserving sinner, an existential wretch, a lost soul on the human highway and all that. Whole villages are being wiped out and I have long hot showers whenever I want. I burn gasoline and electricity and fly all over the place in airplanes, and my little folk songs ain't exactly saving the world...

Still, I ask myself: if I can't be happy, with all my great good fortune, good health, and good luck... who could be? And so I feel that I must be, and I shall be, and I am.

Please play again

For four years now, a bunch of talented Canadian performers have gotten together every winter to tell the world "The Way We Feel" about the songs of Gordon Lightfoot. I've had the great honour of hosting the show, which means getting the best seat in the house to hear a stellar cast do what they do best. Lightfoot's tunes defy genre in their capable hands - blues, country, folk, rock, pop, protest, poetry, even elements of jazz, punk, spoken word, and comedy have all been teased out by a list of artists now too long to name.

As always when we take the Carefree Highway, it's an emotional adventure. The first year, we stood on stage at Hugh's Room with lumps in our throats, knowing Mr. Lightfoot lay in a hospital bed nearby and might never sing again. The second year, we honoured his recovery with overwhelming gratitude. The third year, he hopped up on stage with us and the show became a joyous celebration. This year, with shades of whimsy and wonder, it became a true tradition, and I hope it never stops.

The kind of energy that Lightfoot gathered from far and wide across this land, wrested into works of beauty and depth, and shared with a people desperate to hear their own stories sung, is magnified in the fervent admiration of today's artists, who have the great fortune of having grown up in a Canadian musical tradition. It's tough sometimes to live in the shadows of giants... but boy, is the soil ever fertile in their cool shadows.

That said, as wonderful as it is for me, the amazing high of The Way We Feel is usually followed by a quick dive into depression. Frankly when it's all over and I've come down from wherever it is we go, I usually find myself crying, for reasons I can't even explain fully. I know it has something to do with music's ability to touch people; something to do with nostalgia; something to do with being surrounded by immense talent, and something very much to do with Canada.

Sunday night, after all was said and done, I sat and watched the Olympic closing ceremonies alone, exhausted and exhilirated all at once. Okay, I'm a sap: I started to get choked up watching the whole audience dance to "YMCA," of all things... then (to my embarassment!) watching highlight reel of Frank and Gordon, the animated beavers from the Bell commercials... you can imagine what a mess I was by the time the Native leaders of lower mainland BC had extended their sacred invitation for 2010, and the quadrapalegic mayor of Vancouver had accepted the Olympic flag and done a couple of doughnuts in his wheelchair?

And our Olympians, the ones who'd worked their whole lives for this and weren't going to miss a moment- did you see them dance over there in Torino, cheerfully waving to the world? It's because they've got Lightfeet, I think. Lightfeet and light hearts. Me too.

Monday morning, in the bright late winter sun, I rolled up the rim for the first time this year. It said "Please Play Again." Funny, in Vancouver, they're using the slogan "Come play with us." Coincidence? All I know is The Way We Felt in 2003, when we gathered on stage the first time to sing "Please Play Again, Gord" - and he did.

And we do...

Roll Away rolling away

There's something I rarely say out loud, or even in writing.

But I can't avoid it this time, so here it is: I did it. I launched the new CD.

I can barely even talk about what the evening at Hugh's Room was to me, or did for me. I just want to share and to savour in this space what was surely one of the best nights I've ever had.

Thanks to all of you who made it, to all who sang and played and clapped and hollered, and to all the well-wishers, the silent watchers, the casual visitors, the first-timers, the all-the-timers, the lovers, the dreamers, and you.. Roll Away is now rolling away.

See you down the tracks a ways. Safe journeys!

David.

What Sylvia Tyson said

Last night I went to the Estelle Klein tribute at Hugh's Room in Toronto. Estelle, who passed away recently, had been a lifelong supporter of folk, roots and acoustic music in Ontario, a founder of Mariposa, and a friend to musicians everywhere.

A stellar cast of performers and speakers -many of them winners of the Estelle Klein award for contributions to folk music - honoured Estelle's life and gifts in many marvellous ways, and it was a moving thing to be there.

One of the highlights was hearing Sylvia Tyson sing "You Were on My Mind." Such a brilliant song! The first she ever wrote, I believe, and it went on to sell a million copies and is now burned into the collective Canadian consciousness. I heard that song in my cradle, I swear. I challenge anyone to hear it and not sing along.

I took a moment to thank Ms. Tyson for the acceptance speech she had given a couple of weeks ago, when she received the Estelle Klein award herself at the Ontario Council of Folk Festivals conference in Guelph. That simple and profound speech moved me to tears, and I told her so.

What Ms. Tyson said should be required reading for every artist in this country. With a lifetime of commitment to music and to a better world behind her, she's earned the right to tell it like it is, and she does.

Click here to read a copy of the speech in Word format. You'll understand what I mean. Whatever you may think of the recent US election results, or the state of the world in general, know this: truth and beauty and freedom and love and all the music that expresses them are alive, and well, and on the rise.

The world will be a better place for it.