Horoscope Today: June 12, 2023
Gordon Lightfoot, a great folk singer-songwriter from Canada known for songs like If You Could Read My Mind and Sundown as well as songs that portrayed the national identity of Canada, passed away on Monday. He was 84.
The artist, according to representative Victoria Lord, passed away at a Toronto hospital. His reason of death wasn’t known right away.
One of the most well-known voices to come out of Toronto’s Yorkville folk club scene in the 1960s, Gordon Lightfoot went on to create hundreds of songs, including “Carefree Highway,” “Early Morning Rain,” and “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald,” and record 20 studio albums.
Gordon Lightfoot received nine gold records for albums and singles, three platinum records, and five Grammy nominations in the 1970s. He has recorded 500 songs and participated in far over 1,500 shows in the more than 60 years since he began his career.
He began touring in his later years. Recently, he cancelled future performances in the United States and Canada due to health concerns.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted, “We have lost one of our finest singer-songwriters.
“Gordon Lightfoot helped create Canada’s soundscape by capturing the essence of our nation in his songs. May his legacy endure forever and may his songs continue to inspire future generations.
Numerous musicians, including Elvis Presley, Barbra Streisand, Harry Belafonte, Johnny Cash, Anne Murray, Jane’s Addiction, and Sarah McLachlan, have covered his songs. Bob Dylan once referred to him as a “rare talent.”
The majority of his songs are quite personal, with lyrics that frankly examine his own experiences and discuss concerns about Canadian nationalism. The building of the railroad was portrayed in “Canadian Railroad Trilogy”.
He previously remarked, “I just create the songs about where I am and where I came from. “I use situations as the basis for poems.”
The music of Lightfoot had a distinctive sound. In a 2000 interview, he claimed, “It’s not country, folk, or rock.” However, it exhibits all three strains.
For instance, The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald is a sombre homage to the 29 sailors who perished when the ship sank on Lake Superior during a storm in 1975.
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Although Lightfoot’s parents were aware of his musical prowess even as a young child, he never intended to become a well-known balladeer.
He started singing in the choir at his church and had aspirations of becoming a jazz musician. The soprano, who was 13 years old, took first place in a talent competition at Toronto’s Massey Hall’s Kiwanis Music Festival.
Lightfoot recalled the excitement of performing in front of the audience in an interview from the previous year. It served as a springboard for me.
His barbershop quartet, The Collegiate Four, won a CBC talent competition when he was in high school, proving that the allure of those early days had persisted. In 1956, he played his first note on the guitar, and in the months that followed, he experimented with songwriting. He failed algebra the first time, maybe due to musical preference. He graduated in 1957 after taking the course once again.
By that time, Gordon Lightfoot had already written The Hula Hoop Song, his first significant work, which was influenced by the then-dominant children’s toy. At age 18, he travelled to the United States to pursue a year of music education after unsuccessful attempts to sell the tune. Savings from a job carrying linens to hotels near his hometown helped pay for the trip.
But Gordon Lightfoot quickly saw that life in Hollywood wasn’t for him, and he left for Canada. He committed to relocating to Toronto in order to pursue his artistic goals, taking whatever job that came his way—including one at a bank—before being hired as a square dancer for CBC’s “Country Hoedown.”
His first job was at Fran’s Restaurant, a family-run restaurant in the city that was amenable to his folk tastes. There he met musician friend Ronnie Hawkins.
The singer was residing in Yorkville, then a bohemian neighbourhood where future stars like Neil Young and Joni Mitchell would practise their craft in smoke-filled bars, with a small group of pals in a foreclosed building.
With the single (Remember Me) I’m the One, Gordon Lightfoot made his well-received radio debut in 1962. This led to a string of hit songs and collaborations with other local musicians. That same year, Gordon Lightfoot made a connection with the Mariposa Folk Festival in his hometown of Orillia, Ontario, and began playing there. As a result, he became the festival’s most devoted repeat performer.
By 1964, he was spreading good word of mouth around the city and audiences were beginning to swell. I’m Not Sayin’, a song by Gordon Lightfoot that became popular in Canada the next year, helping make him more well-known in the US.
A few covers performed by different musicians also didn’t harm. Ribbon of Darkness, a recording by Marty Robbins that peaked at No. 1 on the US country charts in 1965, and “For Lovin’ Me,” a song by Gordon Lightfoot that peaked in the US Top 30 thanks to Peter, Paul, and Mary. Thousands of other musicians have since covered the song, which Dylan once said he wished he had recorded.
Gordon Lightfoot had a performance at the Newport Folk Festival in the same year that Dylan shocked crowds by switching to an electric guitar and abandoning his folkie identity.
Gordon Lightfoot was smoothly transitioning to pop music when the folk music craze drew to an end in the late 1960s.
With If You Could Read My Mind, he made his debut on the Billboard chart in 1971. It peaked at No. 5 and has since inspired other covers.
Gordon Lightfoot fame peaked in the middle of the 1970s when “Sundown,” his sole album and debut song, topped the Billboard charts.
Gordon Lightfoot won 12 Juno Awards over his career, including one in 1970 when it was known as the Gold Leaf.
He was admitted in 1986 to what is now known as the Canadian Music Hall of Fame from the Canadian Recording Industry Hall of Fame. In 1997, he was given the Governor General’s award, and in 2001, the Canadian Country Music Hall Of Fame inducted him.
This post was last modified on May 2, 2023 10:16 am
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