Gordon Lightfoot Book, Music and More!

More than any other singer-songwriter, Gordon Lightfoot personified Canada. His robust songs about winter nights, morning rain, being bound for Alberta and sailing on Ontario’s Georgian Bay came closest to expressing for many Canadians the essence of life in the Great White North. Historical epics stood alongside romantic ballads. Author Pierre Berton once said that Lightfoot’s “Canadian Railroad Trilogy” conveyed as much about the building of the national railway as his own best-selling book on the subject. When Lightfoot died Monday evening at the age of 84, leaving a vast legacy of more than 500 songs, Canada lost a masterful composer, a distinctive vocalist and one of its ...

The talented troubadour's fifth album, and first since 2018's Starter Home, offers no big surprises—just more first-rate folk and country songs, many of which sound like they're destined to join such other Paisley classics as “Drinking With a Friend” or "No One But You." But consistency is a virtue worth celebrating. And Paisley's intimate songwriting, warm voice and crisp guitar work is never anything less than exceptional. He's like a modern-day Kristofferson or Lightfoot who keeps hitting it out of the park.  This time around, Paisley works with Afie Jurvanen (Bahamas), who produces and provides additional guitar, as well as sterling side players including drummer Don Kerr, guit...

It surprised no one who knew him that Mendelson Joe would choose to die entirely on his own terms. In a Feb. 7 post on his website titled “That’s It Folks,” the prolific, self-taught musician, painter and activist who had advanced Parkinson’s disease, wrote: “I have ended my job as multi-media artist with the provision of MAID (Medical Assistance in Dying).” Unable to resist a last chance to advocate his beliefs, he added: “I see MAID as a sign of a civilized society. To be born Canadian is a great blessing. We have free speech. We have healthcare. We have MAID. Thank you, Canada.” Mr. Joe was 78. Those closest to him remember a unique man, unwavering in his views and blunt in delivering the...