Kitchener, Ontario review
lightf...@rogers.com
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Lightfoot still holds audience rapt !
May 05, 2008
Robert Reid
KITCHENER
There was a time when the Canadian Pacific Railway not only linked the
country from sea to sea, but was a sustaining national myth.
When Gordon Lightfoot was at the height of his powers, he gave
eloquent voice to that national myth in Canadian Railroad Trilogy.
The CPR has been reduced to a skeleton and Lightfoot, on the cusp of
70, has lost the vocal authority he once possessed.
One of the most poignant moments Saturday night came when the Canadian
legend launched into "There was a time in this far land when the
railroad did not run."
The voice was a raspy whisper and there seemed moments when he wasn't
going to make it to the end of the six-plus-minute epic.
But he did.
It's as if Lightfoot's diminished vocal powers reflected the
diminution of the railway. History and art converged.
Such is the stuff of cultural icons. Lightfoot looked stronger than he
did when he last performed at the Centre in the Square 18 months ago.
And it was evident he was delighted to be here once again.
The capacity crowd openly embraced him. He received standing ovations
at the start and end of the concert and, again, after his encore of
Old Dan's Records.
Most of the 26 songs he performed came from the last 25 years of
songwriting.
His voice fits more comfortably in the contours of newer songs, even
if the collective ear of his audience still yearns for classics from
the 1960s and '70s.
It was the songs from the '70s that received the warmest response,
beginning in the first set with Cotton Jenny and Carefree Highway and
ending with Sundown and The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, one of a
handful of Lightfoot songs to make regular rotation on AM radio over a
career exceeding 40 years.
Ribbon of Darkness was the only early song he performed, albeit in a
lower key.
The heart of the first set was A Painter Passing Through, one of his
best songs of the '90s, and In My Fashion, the song that means the
most to the singer-songwriter.
The heart of his second set featured two masterworks, If you Could
Read My Mind and Don Quixote.
These were greeted with ovations, as audience members hummed and sang
along to lyrics as familiar as old friends reacquainted after long
absences.
Those who attend concerts to hear Lightfoot risk disappointment. But
those who attend to listen share in an intimate creative partnership
between artist and fan.
Lightfoot gives it his all, including breathing and enunciation, even
if some of the notes elude his vocal grasp. He wants us to comprehend
and to understand.
And those who listen attentively, making allowances for the inevitable
encroachment of time, are rewarded.
After all, Lightfoot provided the soundscape for fans who grew up,
went to college and university, married, had children, divorced and
remarried, and retired against the backdrop of his music.
As usual, Lightfoot didn't have much to say between songs. He offered
a couple of humorous riddles and recalled performing at the Centre for
a tribute to Gordie Tapp who he worked with on CBC TV's Country
Hoedown.
He said he's happy he returned to what he did for the first five years
of his career before the recording contracts -- performing live.
People have asked me why Lightfoot continues to perform. It can't be
for the money and he doesn't seem to need the ego gratification, they
speculate.
It's not money, it's not vanity. He performs because it's the
lifeblood of who he is and it's what he was put on Earth to do.
This he knows in the depths of his heart and his soul, which explains
the sense of gratitude you see in his face after he completes each and
every song.
Gordon Lightfoot knows a thing or two about grace.