As you will remember from my last post, I was assigned the task of listing my top ten folk/roots albums of all time by Penguin Eggs Magazine. So far, I've got six on my list, and I will carry on here by telling you about the last four to make my top ten list.

My first six albums all represented music that I had absorbed pretty early in life. So for my last four choices, I thought I would pick some albums that I have come to know and love more recently. I stayed away from anything too new-- for me an album can't become a keeper until I've had the experience of listening to it intensely for a while, putting it away, and then digging it out again because I love it so much.

• Linda Morrison: Line by Line

Linda Morrison is one of my favourite singers of all time. She doesn't perform too much outside her hometown of Montreal. Her album "Line By Line" lived in our car for many years and got played on every car trip. And I mean EVERY car trip. Her music is jazzy, bluesy, her voice is heavenly, and her writing is beautiful.

• Eliza Gilkyson: Paradise Hotel

Every once in a while you hear an artist who redefines everything. Eliza Gilkyson is one of those artists for me. When I first listened to this album, I had to stop and repeat most of the songs because I couldn't believe what she was doing in the space of a few minutes. Her songs are tiny masterpieces.

• Penny Lang: Stone+Sand+Sea+Sky
  

Penny is one of my musical heroes -- she can sing the blues, she can sing old Scottish songs, heck she could sing the phone book and I'd sit at her feet and lap it up. This album, produced by Roma Baran, is a gem.

• Oliver Schroer: Hymns and Hers

I miss Oliver, but I am grateful to have basked even a little bit in the glow of his incredible spirit and creativity. It was hard to choose one of his albums, but this one, recorded during the time he was ill, certainly stands among his best.

And that friends, was the end of my list. After I finished my painstaking process, I held onto the list for a few days, and returned to it a bunch of times to see if I wanted to reconsider any choices. And surprisingly, the list held up (at least for those few days). Without meaning to, I created a list that was exactly split down the middle in terms of American and Canadian albums, which seemed poetic and right (as someone who was born in the U.S., but has lived in Canada for many years). There are some artists that will be familiar to lots of people, and a few that will be complete unknowns, and I liked that. Lots of powerful women in the list, and I liked that. There's old stuff, and (fairly) new stuff. There are many genres and traditions represented. All in all, it seemed like a nice mix. So I held my breath, and sent it off to Penguin Eggs.

And that's the story of my top ten folk/roots albums of all time.

I already wish I could do it all over again, but so be it. I hope that it inspires you to check out some of this music. Here's the list all in one go:

• Jim Kweskin and the Jug Band-See Reverse Side for Title-Vanguard
• Various-Harry Smith Anthology of American Folk Music-Smithsonian/Folkways
• Oliver Schroer-Hymns and Hers-Big Dog Music/Borealis
• Penny Lang-Stone + Sand + Sea + Sky-Borealis
• Stan Rogers-Between the Breaks…Live!-Fogarty’s Cove
• Kate &Anna McGarrigle-Kate &Anna McGarrigle-WEA International
• Eliza Gilkyson-Paradise Hotel-Red House Records
• Hazel Dickens and Alice Gerrard-Hazel and Alice-Rounder
• Sweet Honey in the Rock-Good News-Flying Fish
• Linda Morrison-Line By Line-Heartstrung Music

Labels: Canadian folk music, music history, musical heroes, songwriting

A few weeks ago, I posted the article I wrote for Penguin Eggs Magazine about Pete Seeger. When I submitted my article, the editor also asked me to send them a list of my top ten folk/roots albums of all time for inclusion in the front of the magazine. (Each issue of Penguin Eggs includes a top ten list from someone who is featured in that issue.)

My first reaction? You've got to be kidding! How would I boil it down to ten? And are we talking about my current favourites? The albums that influenced me most? The ones that I think are the most important? The ones that everyone else will think are cool? Each of those lists would be completely different. And, as someone with pretty broad taste, the thought of trying to represent that taste in a tiny list of ten CDs seemed completely impossible.

Not only that, but you don't get to write any explanation. They just print the list -- no context, nothing! At least if I could explain why I made my choices, I might be able to live with it. But noooo, I had to just send them the list in alphabetical order.

Of course, that's what blogs are for. So without further ado, here is the story of my top ten list, split in two parts for easier digestion.

After I foolishly said yes to Penguin Eggs, I began a week of feverish list-making. I started, off the top of my head, listing artists and albums who might be included on the list. The lists went on and on-- forty, fifty artists with no end in sight. I despaired at ever being able to boil it down.

So I started strategizing. First, I realized that I could kill many birds with one stone by including the Harry Smith Anthology of American Folk Music. It's kind of cheating because it's a three-CD boxed set. But it's an amazing collection of recordings and musicians that have remained touchstones through the years: The Carter Family, Mississippi John Hurt, Gus Cannon's Jug Stompers, Charlie Poole. So onto the list it went.

• Various: Harry Smith Anthology of American Folk Music

One down, nine to go.

I started thinking about albums that have stuck with me over time. Albums that I first listened to as a kid or a teenager and that I still love when I hear them now. That quickly generated a long list of albums. I looked at that list and thought about the different things they represented. Some were songwriters, some were singers and interpreters who left an indelible mark, some represented a particular style of music. So out of that list I picked five representative albums:

• Jim Kweskin and the Jug Band: See Reverse Side for Title

We listened to this album so much when I was growing up that I feel like it's in my genes. The band included a young Maria Muldaur (then Maria D'Amato), and her partner Geoff Muldaur, two musicians who are still amongst my absolute favourites.

• Stan Rogers: Between the Breaks...Live!

Unfortunately I never got to hear Stan Rogers sing before he was tragically killed in 1983. Since then I've heard his songs sung by many, many other people, but for my money there's nothing like hearing him straight up, in a live situation, which is what you hear on this album.

• Kate & Anna McGarrigle: Kate & Anna McGarrigle

I remember hearing Kate and Anna McGarrigle for the first time and being entranced by their mixing of musical styles, their unique harmonies, and their incredible way with words. This album still sounds completely fresh to me every time I listen to it.

• Hazel Dickens and Alice Gerrard: Hazel and Alice

My mom had several Hazel and Alice albums in our house, and it's probably because of them that I learned to love old-time music. It's not always "pretty" music. But their voices are haunting, and the music gets you right in the gut.

• Sweet Honey in the Rock: Good News

Sweet Honey in the Rock taught me the transcendent power of human voices raised in song. Although I believe the best way to appreciate them is in a live concert situation, the next best thing is their live concert album, "Good News."

That ended my list of albums that I've listened to since I was young. Six down, four to go.

Tune into my next post to see how the list ends...

Labels: Canadian folk music, music history, musical heroes, songwriting

Over on Maplepost, the Canadian folk music email listserv, there's a conversation going on about the fact that iTunes recently deleted "folk music" from it's list of music genres, choosing instead to use the label "singer-songwriter."

For some people the term "folk music" is, well, corny. They argue that "singer-songwriter" is a term more likely to resonate with younger music fans, and presents a new opportunity for those of us toiling away in the margins of the music industry.

Leaving aside the question where people are supposed to find traditional fiddle music or The Watersons on iTunes now, the move somehow symbolizes the basic identity problem that folk music suffers from in the twenty-first century.

Personally, I can't help but feel disappointed that iTunes did away with the "Folk" category. Call me corny if you want, but I feel like "Folk Music" is the label that best defines what I do.

Yes, I write songs, and I sing, so I guess that makes me a singer-songwriter. But I also feel like I'm a musician connected to a wellspring of music that is part of our common heritage, songs created and shaped by masses of ordinary people passing tunes and words back and forth in an oral tradition. I'm also connected to contemporary musicians who created new music inspired and influenced by that wellspring. I don't know what else to call that wellspring except, "folk music," so I call myself a "folk musician."

But at the same time, there's a dilemma in calling myself a folk musician, which has to do with the picture people get in their head when they hear the term "folk music." And unfortunately, the picture people get in their head doesn't correspond at all with what I know and love about contemporary folk music and the folk tradition. Here's a paraphrase of a conversation I have actually had a few times:

Me: Do you like folk music?
Them: No, I don't like folk music at all. But you know what I really like? Traditional Quebec music, and gospel music, and east coast music, like the fiddle and the step dancing. And I like Bob Dylan a lot.

You get the picture.

So what do I do about this dilemma? Sometimes I call myself a singer-songwriter, and I intersperse terms like "roots music" or "acoustic music" when I'm writing or talking about my music. But frankly, I don't find any of it satisfactory. Mostly, I just wish people got a different picture in their head when they heard the words "folk music."

Labels: community, music biz, music history, songwriting

Recently there was an animated discussion on Maplepost about the fact that many performers today only sing their own songs, which raises questions about what will happen to all the songs that we used to sing, the old songs, the songs by other writers. And what about the current crop of songs? If no one other than the songwriter sings them, will they survive?

I'm a performer who has gone from mostly singing other people's songs and traditional material to mostly singing my own songs. When I first began performing, I didn't write songs at all. I had grown up in a folkie household, exposed to lots of traditional music, and lots of singing in groups at song circles and jams. At the time, I thought I just didn't have anything to say that hadn't already been said by someone far better than I ever could.

The songs I chose to sing were songs that meant something to me. I spent a lot of time learning songs, getting inside them, and making them my own. I also spent a lot of time making music with other people, and through that I learned about listening, making space for other voices and instruments, and creating something spontaneously that is larger than the sum of its parts.

I firmly believe that if I'm any good at writing songs, it's because I spent so much time inhabiting other people's songs, and making music in groups. Without realizing it, I was absorbing the essential elements that make a song work.

When I write songs, I am absolutely writing from my personal experience - like it or not, I am the centre of my own universe, so it's impossible for me to do anything else. But my aim is to use my personal experience as a springboard to say something about that personal experience, hopefully something that will resonate with other people. There are certain things that all human beings go through: We are all born, we all grow and change, we experience joy, love, pain, loss, triumph and so on, we work and struggle, we try to improve our lives and the world around us, we mark important moments, we fall in love, we fall out of love, and then eventually, we die. In my experience most songs with any staying power somehow touch on those universal human experiences.

Recently I've been thinking about the fact that I mostly sing my own songs now. In a way, I wish it weren't so. There is a vast body of brilliant, beautiful, and compelling music out there that deserves to be sung and played. But there are many factors that discourage working musicians from playing or recording anything other than their own songs -- a few people already mentioned royalty income, but there is also the structure of many granting programs in Canada, which subtly, and not-so-subtly encourages musicians to write and record their own songs in order to get the maximum funds possible.

I love writing songs, but I also fear that by singing more and more of my own songs, I'm losing touch with my musical bedrock. And on a larger scale, I wonder if that's happening to us as a musical community. It's exciting that so many great new songs are being written, but I hope we aren't losing the old chestnuts and bits of gold from days gone by.

Labels: Canadian folk music, community, musical heroes, singing, songwriting

My friend Jane Eamon is writing a book called "The Songwriter's Journey." The book will include reflections from a variety songwriters on a variety of questions. So a few months back, she sent me a list of questions to respond to. This is an excerpt of my response to her. I will be posting more excerpts over time.

What is a song? On the surface, it’s words sung to a melody. Simple enough. But songs are complex creatures that work or don’t work on many levels. On a musical level, songs have melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic structures. They can follow or break musical conventions, they can be at different tempos, and in different time signatures. They can mix tempos and time signatures. A song can change key, or visit other keys and come back to the first key. A song can musically draw on or refer to other songs or styles. The music can be discordant, harmonious, energizing, melancholy, driving, simple, complex, funny, touching, sexy, inspiring, or relaxing.

The words can be from the point of view of an object, a person, a deity, or an animal. They can speak from first person, second person, or third person. They can be about nothing. They can be about everything. The lyrics can be playful, happy, sad, personal, technical, angry, old-fashioned, modern, spiritual, or thoroughly common.

The song can have rhymes. Or not. Techniques like onomatapoetry, alliteration, internal rhyme may or may not be used. The words might be concrete. Or they might be abstract. The meaning might be ambiguous, or it might be totally transparent. Metaphor and simile will certainly be there, but they can be more or less obvious, used in different ways, mixed, or not.

The words can “match” the melody in tone or feel. Or they can be juxtaposed. The song form can be simple or complex. There can be an introduction, verses, refrains, choruses, bridges, tags, and codas. There can be a lot of repetition, or very little.

Songs can serve a higher purpose, or they can be just for fun. Or both. A song can evoke strong memories, be a powerful tool for change, make you cry, inspire you to shake your booty, or get you into bed with someone. Songs can reflect and express the hopes, desires, fears, and triumphs of a person, or of a whole community or culture. They can be created in situations of incredible adversity and oppression. They can be of the moment, or they can strike a chord that lasts centuries.

So how do we go about creating these miniature masterpieces that we call songs? I think the answer will be different for every songwriter, and in a way, one of the tasks of the songwriter is to figure out what works for them and go with it. What’s right for me might not work at all for you, and vice versa. Discovering the tools and methods that help you create your best songs will be a lifelong journey if you choose to follow that path.

Labels: songwriting, the artist's life

Last night I rented the movie "Once". It's a low-budget Irish movie about two musicians who meet on the street and develop a musical partnership.

It's rare to see a movie about music that gets it right, but this one does. The main characters are played by musicians. Glen Hansard, the leading man, is a member of the Irish band "The Frames" (he also played the guitarist in one of the other great music movies of all times, "The Commitments"). The leading woman is Marketa Irglova, a compelling piano player and singer.

There's a lot in the movie about the process of musical collaboration, songwriting, trying to survive as an independent musician, and (of course!) love and its many twists and turns. And the music is stunning.

It's quirky, funny, sad, and very moving. Rent it!

Labels: Fun, songwriting, the artist's life

A few weeks ago I sang at Amnesty International Canada's Annual General Meeting. I performed my song "The Streets of Burma," which is being used by Amnesty as part of a campaign to help free one of the monks imprisoned in Myanmar.



In a way, my performance at the AGM was completing a circle. "The Streets of Burma" was born last fall, when I was invited to perform at a benefit for an Amnesty International chapter in Thornbury, Ontario. I had been thinking about writing a song about the "Saffron Revolution" in Burma/Myanmar, and I had jotted down some initial ideas, when I realized that the upcoming Amnesty event would be the perfect place to sing such a song. Deadlines are always helpful for me, so I worked away at the song, and sang the first draft for Amnesty International Canada Group 82 on November 7, 2007.

It was gratifying to sing the song in that context, but I worried that writing a song just wasn't enough. I wanted it to do more than just help people remember what had happened in Myanmar, I wanted it to help spur listeners to action.

Shortly after that, on a whim, I contacted Amnesty Canada's national office to see whether they might be interested in using the song somehow. To my surprise they responded right away, and the result has been a postcard campaign urging the Myanmar government to release U Gambira. Over the last six months I have sung all over Ontario, Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, and Maryland, and everywhere I've gone, audience members have enthusiastically signed postcards to help free U Gambira. I've personally mailed in hundreds and hundreds of postcards, and I know that Amnesty members have also been circulating and mailing the postcards from all across Canada. I never dreamed that my song could have such an immediate, concrete impact, and I'm thrilled to be associated with a respected group like Amnesty International.

So, on June 14th, I got up in front of a room of Amnesty International members, activists from all across Canada, and I sang "The Streets of Burma." It was the very beginning of their weekend meeting, and I knew that the hundreds of delegates there had a lot of hard work in front of them. My song, in the large scheme of things, wasn't the most important thing for Amnesty International Canada that weekend. But in that moment, I felt the synergy of a simple song bringing exactly the right spirit and energy to a particular group of people, and for me, the circle was completed.

Over the course of that afternoon, I heard about Amnesty Canada's activities over the last year. I saw a special tribute to Alex Neve, Secretary General of Amnesty Canada, who recently received the Order of Canada. And I watched democracy in action as the meeting began and members rose to make points or suggestions. I met dozens of Amnesty members from big and small communities. One had been distributing the postcards in the Kitchener-Waterloo school system. Another asked if her chapter could use my song at their event this August. Many took more postcards to distribute in their communities. It was an honour to perform for and meet these hardworking people who are doing so much for human rights.

Thank you, Amnesty International Canada for inspiring me to write "The Streets of Burma,"and for keeping the flame of human rights burning bright around the world. It is a privilege to be a small part of your work.

Labels: community, politics, songwriting