Category Music

Definitely Not A Hit

Many years ago I hosted a daily noon-hour request show at Ottawa’s CHRI-FM. I had mixed feelings about it. The plus was the interaction with the audience. Radio is a solitary occupation, and those who called in with requests were a reminder that there was an audience out there, that the songs I was playing weren’t […]

I Surrender

Remembrance Day is past (though I have one more post to go). Thanksgiving is over too, at least in Canada. Which is why it seems in every store I enter I am hearing Christmas music. I’d complain, but I appear to be a Grinch-like minority. I guess I can live with it for the next […]

The Last Single

If you are a music fan you’ve probably heard the song by now. The final Beatles single was released earlier today. The tune is pleasant enough, but I’m struggling with the band label attached to it. Just because each member of the Fab Four played on it doesn’t make it a Beatles tune to me. […]

Say It Ain’t So

The evidence, including a birth certificate looks pretty conclusive. Buffy Saint-Marie, indigenous Canadian icon, is apparently no more indigenous than I am. For six decades she has been a well-known singer-songwriter, winner of multiple awards, and supposedly she’s not who she says she is. I must admit, I am a little surprised. At the same […]

Legendary

The first tine I heard a Robert Charlebois record I really wasn’t sure what he was singing about. Even with the lyrics in front of me It was 1968 and I was in a high school French class. The teacher thought we should hear and study this new music. It was in French, and then […]

Still On The Road

It was a huge event. A live worldwide satellite broadcast back before the invention of the World Wide Web. The final show for legendary rock band, The Who. I thought of that 1982 concert as I passed by an advertising poster in the London Underground last month advertising The Who’s summer UK tour. Forty-one years […]

Differing Views

My friend Carolyn, who had a hit a few decades ago (my how time flies) with a song called “Seize The Day,” posted the image above. Apparently it has been floating around the internet for a while and people keep sending it to her. I too have days when I realize it was probably a […]

Lightfoot

When the news came late Monday it was as if it was expected. Gordon Lightfoot, Canada’s preeminent singer-songwriter had died at the age of 84. Just a few weeks ago he had cancelled his concert dates for 2023, and while fans were hoping they would be rescheduled I had a sense that the end was […]

Why Live Music?

Concerts are special. Not being able to experience live music in person was, for me, one of the biggest drawbacks of the COVID-19 pandemic. Now that we can gather again, I’m trying to get out more often. Martyn Joseph, the Welsh sing-songwriter, played in Ottawa Friday night. He ends the Canadian leg of his latest […]

I Thought About It

Tickets went on sale today for U2’s Las Vegas residency, with paid members of the fan club having first crack at them. I must admit I was tempted. I’ve never been to Las Vegas. Then I looked at the prices. I don’t want to go to Las Vegas that much, not even to see one […]