WEBVTT - We Remember Gordon Lightfoot 0:00:00.400 --> 0:00:03.400 This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the 0:00:03.480 --> 0:00:08.360 Thing from iHeart Radio. Last week we lost one of 0:00:08.360 --> 0:00:13.400 the greats singer songwriter, folk rock legend, and hands down 0:00:13.480 --> 0:00:16.200 one of the kindest people I've ever met. In the 0:00:16.200 --> 0:00:20.720 making of this podcast, musician Gordon Lightfoot, I wanted to 0:00:20.760 --> 0:00:24.079 take a moment to remember Lightfoot and his influence on 0:00:24.239 --> 0:00:28.080 all who were lucky enough to hear his music. Lightfoot 0:00:28.160 --> 0:00:30.920 was on a short list of music legends I was 0:00:31.000 --> 0:00:34.879 anxious to interview. The opportunity finally presented itself while I 0:00:34.960 --> 0:00:38.440 was attending the Toronto Film Festival. He was one of 0:00:38.479 --> 0:00:42.360 my favorite artists and he will be deeply missed. Here's 0:00:42.479 --> 0:00:49.000 my twenty sixteen conversation with the late Gordon Lightfoot. 0:01:06.880 --> 0:01:09.200 At times, I just don't know. 0:01:11.080 --> 0:01:15.319 How you could be anything but beautiful. 0:01:16.240 --> 0:01:18.600 Over the course of a career that has lasted more 0:01:18.640 --> 0:01:23.280 than fifty years, Canadian singer songwriter Gordon Lightfoot has achieved 0:01:23.319 --> 0:01:31.160 global stardom and exceptional influence. Bob Dylan's a fan. About 0:01:31.200 --> 0:01:34.600 Lightfoot's songs, Dylan said, I can't think of any I 0:01:34.640 --> 0:01:38.440 don't like these songs, which include Beautiful, The Wreck of 0:01:38.440 --> 0:01:41.360 the Edmund Fitzgerald If you could Read My Mind, and 0:01:41.440 --> 0:01:45.480 many others have been treasured by generations of popular musicians 0:01:45.680 --> 0:01:49.920 and listeners around the world. Many people know about the 0:01:49.960 --> 0:01:53.000 folk music revival that brought Bob Dylan to New York 0:01:53.000 --> 0:01:56.080 in the early nineteen sixties, but north of the border 0:01:56.440 --> 0:01:59.600 there was an equivalent explosion of talent at that time, 0:02:00.040 --> 0:02:03.080 and Lightfoot, who got his start singing in boys choirs, 0:02:03.560 --> 0:02:07.400 found himself heading to Canada's cultural capital to try his luck. 0:02:07.760 --> 0:02:11.960 Beautiful Well, I was down in Toronto here looking for work, 0:02:12.000 --> 0:02:15.680 and I got a job as a cooral performer in 0:02:15.680 --> 0:02:20.240 a television series that was on every week. And at 0:02:20.280 --> 0:02:23.959 the same time I branched out and began working in 0:02:24.000 --> 0:02:29.480 the folk oriented places. Because the folk revival had occurred 0:02:29.919 --> 0:02:33.600 around about nineteen sixty and I would have been maybe 0:02:33.639 --> 0:02:38.120 twenty years old there about twenty one, and so I'd 0:02:38.120 --> 0:02:40.760 be working on the TV show in the daytime and 0:02:40.840 --> 0:02:42.959 going out and working at the coffeehouses at night. 0:02:43.880 --> 0:02:47.480 No, you had a period where you wrote jingles for commercials. Correct. 0:02:47.760 --> 0:02:49.160 I tried to make a living. 0:02:49.639 --> 0:02:51.760 They locked me in a room one time, a manager 0:02:52.000 --> 0:02:54.920 in a place on Madison Avenue and just left me 0:02:55.000 --> 0:02:56.000 there all afternoon. 0:02:56.080 --> 0:02:56.560 How'd that go? 0:02:56.960 --> 0:03:00.560 Well? I wrote the commercial, but they they didn't like it. 0:03:01.480 --> 0:03:04.320 They didn't play your version of the commercial. But you didn't. 0:03:04.320 --> 0:03:05.919 You didn't. You went in New York for a long time? 0:03:05.960 --> 0:03:08.160 Correct, Well, I would go back and forth in New 0:03:08.240 --> 0:03:11.240 York all the time because my management company was in 0:03:11.360 --> 0:03:13.880 New York. I was one of the fortunate ones who 0:03:14.000 --> 0:03:18.560 was able to acquire a management situation south of the border, 0:03:18.680 --> 0:03:20.560 so to speak, down in the States, and that was 0:03:20.600 --> 0:03:25.400 in New York. And he was a great manager. He 0:03:25.520 --> 0:03:29.919 recognized my songwriting ability immediately, and I got a couple 0:03:29.919 --> 0:03:33.880 of tunes recorded by Peter, Paul and Mary, and one 0:03:33.880 --> 0:03:36.600 of them went up to number five on the Board 0:03:36.720 --> 0:03:38.200 chart for loving me. 0:03:41.720 --> 0:03:47.160 That's what you get, full loving me. That's what you get, 0:03:47.200 --> 0:03:48.080 full loving me. 0:03:52.000 --> 0:03:55.400 Everything it was gone, as. 0:03:55.160 --> 0:03:59.640 You can see, that's what you get for love. 0:03:59.800 --> 0:04:05.760 And so I was introduced to the industry in the 0:04:05.800 --> 0:04:08.880 States really as a songwriter before they even knew that 0:04:08.960 --> 0:04:12.640 I sang, you know it was. It sort of happened 0:04:13.440 --> 0:04:14.040 on its own. 0:04:14.160 --> 0:04:15.600 Do you think you would have been Do you think 0:04:15.600 --> 0:04:18.039 you would have been happy to just stay in that 0:04:18.160 --> 0:04:21.760 place and just produce records and write music and was 0:04:21.800 --> 0:04:23.880 performing the goal all along? Did you want? Were you 0:04:23.920 --> 0:04:25.040 itching to do that? Oh? 0:04:25.120 --> 0:04:29.080 Yeah, yeah, I wanted to even as a child, you know, 0:04:29.120 --> 0:04:33.479 I didn't mind singing in my grandmother's house on the 0:04:33.560 --> 0:04:36.360 Sunday get togethers. You know, they would single me out 0:04:36.360 --> 0:04:40.880 and I would solo. I enjoyed the feel of the 0:04:40.960 --> 0:04:46.479 communication that and I could feel it then. That's what 0:04:46.520 --> 0:04:50.000 I feel now. I feel a communication when I have 0:04:50.000 --> 0:04:52.440 a wonderful band and we have a great repertoire and 0:04:52.520 --> 0:04:55.760 we just lay the stuff right out there. 0:04:55.560 --> 0:04:57.160 For them, just pure joy. 0:04:57.600 --> 0:05:01.480 Yeah, I enjoy doing that. But when you were take 0:05:01.520 --> 0:05:04.440 care if it pays the bills, that's. 0:05:04.320 --> 0:05:08.560 A that's a desirable silver lining there. Yeah, all that 0:05:08.600 --> 0:05:12.240 hard work, well, but when you were writing, when you 0:05:12.360 --> 0:05:15.919 turn that corner and singing takes over. You know. 0:05:16.320 --> 0:05:18.880 I was doing like like small time stuff, and all 0:05:18.880 --> 0:05:23.040 of a sudden I was asked to come to New 0:05:23.120 --> 0:05:29.400 York and open for Paul Butterfield concert nineteen sixty six thereabouts. 0:05:29.440 --> 0:05:32.640 I suppose sixty So you won the radio then recording. 0:05:33.279 --> 0:05:35.719 No, we didn't actually get on the radio until about 0:05:35.760 --> 0:05:36.800 nineteen seventy one. 0:05:37.160 --> 0:05:38.760 What was the first song that I mean? I have 0:05:38.760 --> 0:05:40.279 a list here. But what was the if you could 0:05:40.279 --> 0:05:40.839 read my mind. 0:05:40.720 --> 0:05:46.120 If you could read my mind, if you knew that ghost. 0:05:45.760 --> 0:05:52.560 Is me and I won't be sad as long as 0:05:52.839 --> 0:05:56.200 time I'm a ghost. You can't see. 0:05:57.839 --> 0:05:59.880 The record was that it was my first album on 0:06:00.040 --> 0:06:04.280 Warner Brothers, and it was out for eight months and 0:06:04.320 --> 0:06:08.000 there was no single, and all of a sudden other promotion. 0:06:08.120 --> 0:06:11.320 Guys said to his girlfriend, we listen to this and 0:06:11.400 --> 0:06:14.760 come back and give me an opinion. On Monday morning, 0:06:15.160 --> 0:06:17.280 his girlfriend she likes, if you could read my. 0:06:17.240 --> 0:06:22.559 Mind, where the hard he is gone, the hero would 0:06:22.600 --> 0:06:23.080 be me. 0:06:25.200 --> 0:06:26.520 Hero of. 0:06:29.120 --> 0:06:36.320 You won't read that book because the endangers. 0:06:36.680 --> 0:06:39.120 If you could read my mind hits the charts, so 0:06:39.200 --> 0:06:42.159 to speak, it becomes a big hit for you. What 0:06:42.400 --> 0:06:44.520 changes for you, Like did you have to sit there 0:06:44.520 --> 0:06:48.040 and say, oh, people are telling you to do things 0:06:48.120 --> 0:06:50.000 differently and now you're going to be a success and 0:06:50.040 --> 0:06:51.200 they want you to We. 0:06:51.200 --> 0:06:54.279 Get so busy we got to hire an aircraft. Literally, 0:06:54.480 --> 0:06:57.000 that's what happened. We had to hire an aircraft. Everyone 0:06:57.040 --> 0:07:01.040 wants to book, say, get the same place two different 0:07:01.040 --> 0:07:02.080 places in one day. 0:07:03.279 --> 0:07:06.640 So when you reached that point, that and then that 0:07:06.720 --> 0:07:09.320 turning point is the is the next imperative. You've got 0:07:09.360 --> 0:07:11.440 to start coming up with more songs and writing more songs. 0:07:11.640 --> 0:07:13.679 Oh yeah, yeah, you record. Yeah. 0:07:14.440 --> 0:07:18.840 We made three more albums and nothing happened. But I 0:07:18.920 --> 0:07:22.400 kept doing one a year and something had to give eventually, 0:07:22.440 --> 0:07:25.760 And then one summer I wrote that song Sundown, and 0:07:25.880 --> 0:07:29.120 I knew that it was it was going to happen, 0:07:29.320 --> 0:07:31.520 that it was it was the right thing, and it did. 0:07:31.600 --> 0:07:34.320 When we're up to number one. That was our second one. 0:07:35.320 --> 0:07:37.840 Then it was almost seven two albums later that we 0:07:37.880 --> 0:07:42.120 had the record the Abne Fitzgerald, and that happened all 0:07:42.160 --> 0:07:47.840 by itself too. That became a responsibility. It did a 0:07:47.960 --> 0:07:49.680 very large responsibil. 0:07:49.280 --> 0:07:52.880 The song became a responsible But tell me in your 0:07:52.880 --> 0:07:55.320 own words. Many people go on about that, about the 0:07:55.400 --> 0:07:57.800 tragedy and the history, and it's a very, you know, 0:07:57.920 --> 0:08:01.800 important song to people, you know history. People talk about 0:08:01.840 --> 0:08:04.160 it very reverentially. Why was it important to you? 0:08:05.960 --> 0:08:11.960 Because it was only one verse contained any conjecture of 0:08:12.000 --> 0:08:14.280 any kind of the rest of it was taken from 0:08:14.800 --> 0:08:18.840 directly from newspaper articles and the aftermath, which only lasted 0:08:18.840 --> 0:08:21.600 for about three days. If I had not wrote that song, 0:08:22.720 --> 0:08:26.480 everybody would have forgotten about it. A week after it happened, 0:08:30.000 --> 0:08:33.000 I said, people are all around the Great Lakes area 0:08:33.040 --> 0:08:36.120 are going to wonder if the song is appropriate. And 0:08:36.600 --> 0:08:40.240 some did wonder about it, whether it was appropriate for 0:08:40.360 --> 0:08:42.400 me to have written a song of that kind. But 0:08:44.880 --> 0:08:48.800 I had gone pretty much with the newspaper articles that 0:08:48.840 --> 0:08:51.360 I scraped up. We had no CPS in those days, 0:08:51.400 --> 0:08:54.560 and you went back that you went to the publisher 0:08:54.640 --> 0:09:00.840 and got the back copies of the newspapers. And it's accurate. 0:09:01.760 --> 0:09:06.240 It's accurate in the way the story on folds. I 0:09:06.240 --> 0:09:08.360 remember the night I wrote it. I was working in 0:09:08.400 --> 0:09:11.600 a deserted house and there was a heck of a 0:09:11.640 --> 0:09:15.200 windstorm going on right in Toronto that night, and I 0:09:15.240 --> 0:09:18.840 remember myself wondering, Gee, I wonder what it's like up 0:09:19.200 --> 0:09:21.440 on the Great Lakes right now, because I sailed up 0:09:21.440 --> 0:09:24.200 there myself. I had a couple of two different sailboats 0:09:24.280 --> 0:09:28.040 up there, and wondered always, I wonder what the Great 0:09:28.080 --> 0:09:31.400 Lakes are like tonight, because you're always hearing about what 0:09:31.520 --> 0:09:34.280 things happening up in the Great Lakes. And eleven o'clock 0:09:34.320 --> 0:09:37.040 in the evening there was a report of a ship 0:09:37.080 --> 0:09:41.480 sinking three hours earlier in the Lake Superior, and they're 0:09:41.840 --> 0:09:45.880 out looking for the people, and they never found any 0:09:45.920 --> 0:09:51.120 of them, and twenty nine people gone. And I had 0:09:51.120 --> 0:09:55.199 a melody, and I had some cords that I was 0:09:55.400 --> 0:10:00.559 knocking around in this deserted house with the wind howling outside. 0:10:02.240 --> 0:10:05.040 Really it was kind of kind of a classic setting 0:10:05.120 --> 0:10:08.200 to write a song like that. So I began writing 0:10:08.200 --> 0:10:11.320 the song and finished writing it like two or three 0:10:11.440 --> 0:10:13.880 weeks later. We were right in the middle of a 0:10:14.400 --> 0:10:17.439 recording a series of recording sessions at the time, so 0:10:17.559 --> 0:10:20.440 we put it in and didn't work the first day. 0:10:20.480 --> 0:10:24.440 We put it in the second day and did you 0:10:24.440 --> 0:10:26.200 ever stomp and Tom Connors? 0:10:26.920 --> 0:10:30.400 No, I will. Now I'm gonna run down and get 0:10:30.440 --> 0:10:32.520 all of stomp and Tom Connery he was recording. 0:10:32.559 --> 0:10:35.480 He was one of our very famous Canadian folk artists. 0:10:36.200 --> 0:10:40.680 Stomping Tom Connors poke his hit and said that sounds 0:10:40.720 --> 0:10:45.080 like a hit. He just heard the melody going like 0:10:45.120 --> 0:10:48.400 he didn't heard the lyrics or anything. So the appeal 0:10:48.440 --> 0:10:50.240 of the song is definitely in the melody and the 0:10:50.320 --> 0:10:54.520 chord changes, and then the story of the actually made itself. 0:10:54.520 --> 0:10:57.920 I got as accurately as I could by pursuing old 0:10:57.960 --> 0:10:58.880 news articles. 0:11:01.559 --> 0:11:04.960 The wind and the wires made the tattle tale sound, 0:11:05.360 --> 0:11:12.240 and the wave rope over the railing, and every man 0:11:12.480 --> 0:11:15.719 you as the captain did to twis the Witch and 0:11:15.960 --> 0:11:17.640 love and stealing. 0:11:21.040 --> 0:11:22.880 The dawn came leading, and. 0:11:22.960 --> 0:11:26.400 The breakfast had the week when the girls in Lovember 0:11:26.640 --> 0:11:32.520 and slashing what afternoon came into screeeze and rad in 0:11:32.600 --> 0:11:35.160 the base of a hurricane west wind. 0:11:43.160 --> 0:11:55.520 We'll have more with Gordon Lightfoot after the break I'm ALC. 0:11:55.559 --> 0:11:58.000 Baldwin and this is here's the thing. I spoke with 0:11:58.120 --> 0:12:02.920 musician Gordon Lightfoot twenty sixteen. I was curious how his 0:12:03.080 --> 0:12:06.720 musicianship had changed over time and what it was like 0:12:06.800 --> 0:12:10.360 for him recording and performing in the early days. 0:12:11.080 --> 0:12:15.960 The first time I started doing it, I felt under like, 0:12:16.040 --> 0:12:19.120 I'm not confident in what I was doing, what I 0:12:19.200 --> 0:12:22.160 was hearing, I didn't I didn't like what I. 0:12:22.160 --> 0:12:24.200 Was hearing of your own stuff. 0:12:24.320 --> 0:12:27.200 Yeah, I don't like the sound. The sound of my 0:12:27.360 --> 0:12:31.320 voice bothered me. And you know, I started working on 0:12:31.360 --> 0:12:34.000 that stuff and I've been working on it ever since. 0:12:34.960 --> 0:12:38.800 On my vocal and I've worked on my intonation, on 0:12:38.880 --> 0:12:40.080 my instruments. 0:12:40.520 --> 0:12:43.079 Someone told me that when you land because you perform 0:12:43.120 --> 0:12:45.920 in so many different areas. You really dwell on tuning 0:12:45.920 --> 0:12:47.440 your instruments alot. Correct. 0:12:48.040 --> 0:12:51.880 Yeah, sometimes I chase it around too, but I've learned 0:12:52.520 --> 0:12:55.719 through the years that there is a method that you 0:12:55.840 --> 0:12:58.760 can get me into into Scarborough fair Country, you know, 0:12:58.880 --> 0:13:01.439 like the like the sound that Simon and Garfuncle used 0:13:01.480 --> 0:13:07.120 to get on their acoustic orchestral arrangements that they put 0:13:07.160 --> 0:13:13.720 together for their songs. And it actually came it became 0:13:13.880 --> 0:13:16.959 real for me maybe six or seven years ago after 0:13:17.000 --> 0:13:19.880 I was recovering from a mini stroke that I had 0:13:19.920 --> 0:13:21.719 and I had to practice a lot more all of 0:13:21.760 --> 0:13:25.320 a sudden, so it really got me zeroing in on it. 0:13:25.400 --> 0:13:29.800 And it all comes down to the fifths and the octaves, 0:13:29.920 --> 0:13:31.080 and I'll just leave it at that. 0:13:31.800 --> 0:13:34.600 I'm just a handmaiden here for all you guitar people 0:13:34.640 --> 0:13:37.800 out there. That's Gordon Lightfoot's gift to you and his 0:13:38.000 --> 0:13:40.760 present to you. That's the fifths and the octaves. And 0:13:40.800 --> 0:13:44.079 I don't have one damn idea the fifths and the eye. 0:13:44.120 --> 0:13:45.960 I don't know what the hell he's talking about, but 0:13:46.000 --> 0:13:50.720 there it is. There's his message to you today. McCartney 0:13:50.720 --> 0:13:52.920 told me when I spoke to him, once Paul told 0:13:52.920 --> 0:13:55.400 me that he said, in the beginning they would go 0:13:55.440 --> 0:13:59.440 into a recording studio of the Beatles, and he said, 0:13:59.720 --> 0:14:01.760 you know, it was really these weren't his words, but 0:14:01.800 --> 0:14:04.360 the message was kind of like time is money. He said. 0:14:04.400 --> 0:14:06.040 These guys were like, you know, we want two songs 0:14:06.040 --> 0:14:08.240 in the morning, and then you go have a lunch 0:14:08.240 --> 0:14:09.440 break and you go down to the pub and you 0:14:09.440 --> 0:14:11.480 have a cigarette, you have a fission chips where you 0:14:11.480 --> 0:14:13.920 come back. They want two songs after they really moved 0:14:13.960 --> 0:14:16.160 along at a clip when they were doing the first 0:14:16.679 --> 0:14:20.080 albums for Parlophone or whoever it was, or em I, 0:14:20.680 --> 0:14:22.640 and then when they became, you know, the success they 0:14:22.640 --> 0:14:24.720 obviously became, then they would take a year. You know, 0:14:24.760 --> 0:14:26.280 all musicians are the same. Then they would take a 0:14:26.400 --> 0:14:28.280 year to do their next album. You know, they would 0:14:28.320 --> 0:14:32.080 do Sergeant Pepper's or what everyone really really luxuriate and 0:14:32.640 --> 0:14:35.120 getting every They gave them more time because it was 0:14:35.160 --> 0:14:38.520 worth it was worth that investment for them. Was the 0:14:38.520 --> 0:14:40.280 same true with you. Do you find that the more 0:14:40.320 --> 0:14:43.160 successful you became, the more time you wanted to make music. 0:14:43.640 --> 0:14:46.440 Perhaps later on, but I pretty much stuck to the 0:14:47.800 --> 0:14:50.280 to the schedule as much as I could. We made 0:14:50.280 --> 0:14:53.760 like eight or nine albums in ten years there, so. 0:14:55.320 --> 0:14:56.640 You didn't feel rushed by them. 0:14:57.240 --> 0:15:01.160 No, we were getting more time. But I was also 0:15:01.240 --> 0:15:04.080 improving because what I didn't like hearing I was I 0:15:04.160 --> 0:15:08.960 was changing all the time. I was always an improvement venture, 0:15:09.600 --> 0:15:11.960 like a guy building himself up and for to play 0:15:12.000 --> 0:15:15.240 on an important sports team. You know they got it. 0:15:15.240 --> 0:15:18.960 It's just not just the game, it's the preparation. Say 0:15:19.000 --> 0:15:22.440 you haven't played for for a month and all of 0:15:22.480 --> 0:15:24.200 a sudden you got to get back up on stage. 0:15:24.200 --> 0:15:25.760 You should be able to crank it out just like 0:15:25.800 --> 0:15:29.040 it was just you did the show last night, right. 0:15:29.880 --> 0:15:33.160 But you like rehearsing, Yeah, well you believe rehearsing. 0:15:33.200 --> 0:15:35.880 Yeah, you're learning new material or you're going back into 0:15:35.960 --> 0:15:39.040 the old catalog with which we do. Because I have 0:15:39.080 --> 0:15:43.640 a rotational situation going on, the biggest problem in my 0:15:43.680 --> 0:15:46.240 whole life's been too many tunes, too many women. 0:15:46.760 --> 0:15:50.280 For my listeners. Right now, Gordon Lightfoot is turning sheepishly 0:15:50.320 --> 0:15:53.520 toward his wife with a sheepish grin on his face, 0:15:53.560 --> 0:15:56.600 and she just patted his shoulder to say it's okay. 0:15:56.320 --> 0:15:58.240 Gordon, Well I can't step on your toes. 0:15:58.520 --> 0:16:00.680 Yeah, you can't do that. But I remember reading I 0:16:00.680 --> 0:16:03.720 remember listening to an article. I remember reading an article 0:16:03.720 --> 0:16:06.480 that the Rolling Stones did years ago, and I was 0:16:06.720 --> 0:16:09.880 taken by how you know, in terms of musicianship, Jagger 0:16:09.920 --> 0:16:13.440 and Keith Ridgard were very, very married to rehearsal. And 0:16:13.480 --> 0:16:15.000 for you to say that that is a great meaning 0:16:15.000 --> 0:16:16.920 to me. For you, someone as great an artist as 0:16:16.960 --> 0:16:21.360 you are, that the preparation and the preparation beforehand so 0:16:21.360 --> 0:16:23.920 that when you when the audience is there, bloom, you 0:16:23.960 --> 0:16:26.360 strum that guitar and you're you're ready. You're ready. 0:16:27.280 --> 0:16:31.840 Yeah, And we we have the the artistra itself. I 0:16:31.880 --> 0:16:35.480 have four really talented guys. 0:16:35.320 --> 0:16:37.880 And very loyal people. I read about that your band 0:16:37.920 --> 0:16:38.680 is very loyal to. 0:16:40.120 --> 0:16:44.040 Well, I mean it's there's no reason why they should 0:16:44.080 --> 0:16:48.400 not be. You know, we're all the same path. I mean, 0:16:48.480 --> 0:16:52.840 we just want to do a great job and you 0:16:53.000 --> 0:16:56.040 got to like make almost make a science out of it. 0:16:56.120 --> 0:16:59.680 I don't know. My guys are all professionals. I mean 0:16:59.720 --> 0:17:04.760 there's they're serious musicians. Yeah yeah, and they do other things. 0:17:04.840 --> 0:17:08.800 I just got to let them know what's coming up. 0:17:08.880 --> 0:17:11.560 You know, what were you listening to back then? In 0:17:11.600 --> 0:17:13.760 the sixties when you were coming up, Who did you 0:17:13.800 --> 0:17:14.199 listen to? 0:17:14.520 --> 0:17:17.320 Well, I was listening to the country music, you know, 0:17:17.440 --> 0:17:20.240 Hank Snow and then folks. It was Pete Seeger, and 0:17:20.280 --> 0:17:24.919 it was Bob Gibson. It was Bob Dylan and Simon 0:17:25.000 --> 0:17:27.879 and Garfunkel, and you know Peter Paul and Mary and 0:17:28.080 --> 0:17:32.320 Ian and Sylvia. They were a duet and it was 0:17:32.320 --> 0:17:34.200 a beautiful act that they had. 0:17:36.480 --> 0:17:39.040 Eventually you met these people, well I met, but you 0:17:39.119 --> 0:17:40.080 became one of them. 0:17:39.960 --> 0:17:42.679 My management company because they were the first ever to 0:17:42.760 --> 0:17:46.879 do one of do any of my songs was Ian 0:17:47.040 --> 0:17:52.440 and Sophia, which one for Loving Me and Early Morning Rain. 0:17:54.080 --> 0:17:56.800 I found an opening with the Folk Revival, you know. 0:17:56.880 --> 0:17:59.280 So I was lucky to be a part of that, 0:17:59.400 --> 0:18:04.280 to write that one through and survive. Uh, there's there's 0:18:04.320 --> 0:18:08.080 nothing much out there these days. Uh, you know, they're 0:18:08.119 --> 0:18:11.600 they're they're busking. We've got a look a whole bunch 0:18:11.680 --> 0:18:15.479 of people here in Toronto who who are hovering around 0:18:15.520 --> 0:18:19.000 all the time that the folk oriented artists who are 0:18:19.080 --> 0:18:24.600 songwriters and you know, trying to get somewhere, and some 0:18:24.400 --> 0:18:28.600 of some of them are succeeding in some or not. 0:18:28.720 --> 0:18:30.479 I get to hear a lot of the stuff because 0:18:31.040 --> 0:18:35.000 it comes across my desk and I get to hear it, 0:18:36.160 --> 0:18:40.840 and you wish, you know that something grand could happen 0:18:40.920 --> 0:18:42.720 for these people, but you don't know what to do. 0:18:43.240 --> 0:18:45.159 All you can do is respond. 0:18:45.359 --> 0:18:46.520 Right, encourage. 0:18:46.920 --> 0:18:47.280 Yeah. 0:18:47.520 --> 0:18:50.120 Where do you think people learn to hone their craft 0:18:50.240 --> 0:18:53.240 as a musician in in in clubs and performing live? 0:18:54.320 --> 0:18:56.520 Well, I was as well as I was working in 0:18:56.640 --> 0:19:01.040 bars too, you know, like bars and lounges as well 0:19:01.080 --> 0:19:06.040 as the coffeehouses. And so I had the kind of 0:19:06.119 --> 0:19:10.800 a repertoire that was acceptable to plant bars. So I 0:19:11.240 --> 0:19:14.560 got him following in a couple of these bars. Then 0:19:14.920 --> 0:19:20.119 I've sort of moved uptown into the village area, you 0:19:20.240 --> 0:19:24.440 or Yorkville, which was just coming into bloom here in town, 0:19:24.560 --> 0:19:27.919 and get into places like the Purple Onion, and then 0:19:27.960 --> 0:19:31.840 the Riverboat, which was really the plumb of the whole lot, 0:19:31.960 --> 0:19:36.880 was the Riverboat because Bernie Feeder brought every person into 0:19:36.920 --> 0:19:39.919 that place. You could fosply image and play there, from 0:19:40.160 --> 0:19:44.399 James Taylor to Joni Mitchell to to Kneel Young right 0:19:44.480 --> 0:19:46.159 on down the line. 0:19:46.200 --> 0:19:47.920 Is he is he a friend of yours? Yes? 0:19:47.960 --> 0:19:48.280 He is? 0:19:48.359 --> 0:19:54.000 Yeah, your songs and you're singing of your song, you're 0:19:54.040 --> 0:19:56.960 performing of your songs is so vulnerable and so emotional. 0:19:57.160 --> 0:19:59.200 What was the most difficult song for you to write 0:19:59.280 --> 0:20:01.480 or among the most difficult songs for you to write? 0:20:02.160 --> 0:20:05.040 I'll tell you that a lot of times you don't 0:20:05.040 --> 0:20:09.760 know you're doing it. You're drawing the material from your 0:20:10.920 --> 0:20:14.320 subconscious you know, you don't actually know what you're doing. 0:20:15.160 --> 0:20:17.560 You're you know, you're drawing it from somewhere, and then 0:20:18.119 --> 0:20:20.920 later down the line, three or four weeks later, you 0:20:21.040 --> 0:20:26.119 can sign it back to the actual event that brought 0:20:26.160 --> 0:20:31.120 it on. I mean, that's like, if you could read 0:20:31.200 --> 0:20:35.800 my mind is about actually the crumbling. 0:20:35.240 --> 0:20:38.560 Of a Really was that painful for you to write? No? 0:20:38.680 --> 0:20:40.320 Because I didn't know what I was doing right I 0:20:40.359 --> 0:20:43.040 wrote it. It's just I didn't really. 0:20:42.920 --> 0:20:45.280 Tell me that all these beautiful folks songs that people 0:20:45.320 --> 0:20:48.200 weep when they listen to, you're just like tossing it off, 0:20:48.240 --> 0:20:50.640 like I don't really know what this is. Let's take 0:20:50.640 --> 0:20:52.359 a song for example. Let me let me pick one 0:20:52.400 --> 0:20:54.679 song now, one of my favorite songs of yours. I mean, 0:20:54.680 --> 0:20:58.440 a song that I just kills me is beautiful, describe 0:20:58.440 --> 0:21:01.080 to me recording the song beautiful. I mean, do you 0:21:01.119 --> 0:21:03.240 go out with your friends and your get ship faced 0:21:03.280 --> 0:21:04.840 drunk and you come in with a hangover and just 0:21:04.920 --> 0:21:07.280 lay this thing down and you play poker ro all night? 0:21:07.400 --> 0:21:08.639 Or do you enter a state? 0:21:11.320 --> 0:21:16.480 First I get a card progression, Then I get a melody. 0:21:17.560 --> 0:21:20.920 It's fifth syn octaves, people, it's fifth syn octaves. 0:21:21.040 --> 0:21:24.240 Then I get the lyric. You got the melody, you 0:21:24.320 --> 0:21:26.920 got the chords, but you don't know, so you draw. 0:21:28.320 --> 0:21:31.960 You find an idea that that fits the fits the melody. 0:21:32.240 --> 0:21:36.119 That's Gordon Light for the songwriter, Gordon Light for the singer, 0:21:36.400 --> 0:21:40.600 the performer. Do you enter a state? Do you take 0:21:40.640 --> 0:21:44.280 yourself to a place when you perform your recorded music 0:21:45.119 --> 0:21:45.639 or you don't? 0:21:46.320 --> 0:21:52.119 Well, I can, I can use my imagination. I actually 0:21:52.200 --> 0:21:56.520 saw it as a sincere love turn to a guy 0:21:56.560 --> 0:22:00.800 for his wife or his girlfriend. It it reminds me 0:22:01.520 --> 0:22:03.560 of when I was I learned how to sing with 0:22:03.680 --> 0:22:08.240 emotion when I was about twelve, when I was doing 0:22:08.400 --> 0:22:14.120 handling material from Handles Messiah, the Voice of Him who 0:22:14.280 --> 0:22:16.440 Cries in the Wilderness and all that sort of thing, 0:22:17.480 --> 0:22:22.360 And I learned what emotion meant when when I were 0:22:22.720 --> 0:22:28.840 saying handles Messiah. At age twelve, I sang in a 0:22:28.880 --> 0:22:33.800 competition so I could apply. It was easy for me 0:22:33.880 --> 0:22:40.240 to apply to summon up that emotional uh something or 0:22:40.280 --> 0:22:42.320 whatever it is when it came time to put that 0:22:42.440 --> 0:22:46.080 song down. But I didn't have to the point at 0:22:46.080 --> 0:22:48.160 the beginning that I wanted to have it. And that's 0:22:48.160 --> 0:22:51.560 why I've been working on all my life is getting 0:22:52.920 --> 0:22:58.199 controlling that emotional approach to it, making it work for me. 0:22:58.800 --> 0:23:00.840 You don't overdo it, and. 0:23:00.880 --> 0:23:03.359 You don't know what I'm saying. That's what's beautiful about 0:23:03.400 --> 0:23:05.520 your music is you go right up to a point, 0:23:05.840 --> 0:23:07.520 but you don't do a lot of handholding. You let 0:23:07.520 --> 0:23:09.520 the audience do the crying for you. You know what I mean. 0:23:09.560 --> 0:23:13.280 You're your We balance it off with a lot of 0:23:13.320 --> 0:23:15.880 toe chappers. You got lots of to. 0:23:18.880 --> 0:23:22.080 For a prime example of the delivery Gordon Lightfoot does 0:23:22.119 --> 0:23:26.040 so well. You don't have to look beyond this song sundown. 0:23:28.160 --> 0:23:31.639 I can see you land back seven. 0:23:33.119 --> 0:23:37.960 Room where you do what you don't confess. 0:23:38.280 --> 0:23:41.720 Some better dickas. 0:23:43.920 --> 0:23:50.280 Around coming up. Lightfoot talks about some of his musical 0:23:50.320 --> 0:23:54.160 inspirations that explains why he and Bob Dylan didn't get 0:23:54.200 --> 0:23:58.919