Happy Canada Day!

“A Case of You”, composed by Joni Mitchell about her times with Leonard Cohen, as first performed by Allison Crowe on CBC Radio’s “Sounds Like Canada” with host Shelagh Rogers – cover photo by Billie Woods captured on Pender Island. A combo Canadian as a plate of poutine in the snow.

Happy, peaceful, July 1^st!

Happy Birthday, dear Joni!

Happy Birthday to a child who’s moved 74 times ’round the seasons, skated o’er plenty clear frozen streams – and, as she’s circled, given us music of profound truth and beauty. Joni Mitchell, the great artist born on this date in Fort Macleod, Alberta – salut!

From Joni’s “Blue” album – in tribute, compatriot Allison Crowe with “River”:

Allan Showalter's "10 Reasons I Love Canada"

“O wad some Pow'r the giftie gie us To see oursels as others see us!” quoth the bard Robbie Burns. A Canada Day post from the personal blog of Allan Showalter, the word-spinner of magic @ "Cohencentric: Leonard Cohen Considered": http://allanshowalter.com/2017/07/01/10-reasons-love-canada

10 Reasons I Love Canada

July 1, 2017  /  Allan Showalter

Leonard Cohen

Robertson Davies

Allison Crowe

Holly Cole

k.d. lang

Barenaked Ladies

Ron Sexsmith

Carol Shields1

Joni Mitchell

Gordon Lightfoot

1. American born but really, truly Canadian

River - Day 3 on Musical Advent Calendar

“River” flows this third Day on our Musical Advent Calendar. Composed by Joni Mitchell, supreme artist of heart and mind, here it’s explored by Allison Crowe, another Scorpio from the North, on this track on “Tidings” (http://music.allisoncrowe.com/album/tidings)

Each day through Christmas a new music video link to savour, songs sacred and secular, traditional to modern, will open @ http://allisoncrowe.com/news.html

River from Allison Crowe on Vimeo.

Songs of Life and Death

With, both, “Cover Me” and “Coverville”, a pair of the world’s premiere homes for lovers of cover songs, sending birthday wishes to Allison Crowe today, it’s an invitation to explore the artist’s body of interpretive work. All music can be found linked via the “ABC List” @ http://www.allisoncrowe.com/ABC.html 

A supreme interpreter and arranger of songs - traditional, Celtic, jazz, Broadway, hymns, carols and aires – Crowe’s famed for her renewal of popular songs – including those first penned by Canadian icons Joni Mitchell and Leonard Cohen, and Atlantic coast treasures Gary O’Driscoll, Al Pittman / Ron Hynes, Wince Coles, Harry Hibbs+, alongside tunes from The Beatles, Pearl Jam, Tori Amos, Ani DiFranco,Counting Crows, Lovin’ Spoonful, Phil Ochs, Annie Lennox, Radiohead, Ronnie Shannon, Patty Griffin, Kris Kristofferson, the Rolling Stones and more.

In this rich and varied repertoire, each of Crowe’s singular performances is a favourite.

Having just come off the road with Allison Crowe and Band – during our travels we learned of Leonard Cohen’s passing. Tonight, his manager released these details:

“Leonard Cohen died during his sleep following a fall in the middle of the night on November 7th. The death was sudden, unexpected, and peaceful. He is survived by his children Adam and Lorca, and his three grandchildren Cassius (Adam’s son), and Viva and Lyon (Lorca’s daughter and son).” http://cohencentric.com/2016/11/16/statement-details-leonard-cohens-death-robert-kory-president-rk-management-manager-leonard-cohen

Allison Crowe, together with countless people all over our world, shares a special bond with the bard “born with the gift of a golden voice”. This relationship intertwines with the DNA of Leonard Cohen songs – among those in her repertoire is his universal “Hallelujah”. Of this, “Cover Me” founder and editor Ray Padgett opines:

“Born in British Columbia, Crowe has amassed a loyal following in Canada and Europe. The songwriter’s songwriter pure tones sound like a bell, no show-off acrobatics necessary. The amazing thing isn’t just that she performs the best version of Leonard Cohen‘s oft-covered ‘Hallelujah’ (sorry Jeff); the amazing thing is that she does so using the same solo piano style that everyone else does. There’s nothing particularly creative about it; her voice is just that good! So throw all those other ‘sensitive’ covers. This one’s the keeper.”

The blog 'anacronyms' says:“Crowe's version is a living thing, a meditation and a celebration and a benediction."

Thank you, sincerely, L. Cohen. We have the music.

Wedding Song - Cohencentric's Marvellous Take

Allan Showalter, always illuminating and entertaining concierge and much more at the Chelsea Hotel of culture blogs, “Cohencentric: Leonard Cohen Considered”, shares the keys to Allison Crowe’s “Wedding Song” video – its musical gallery hung with fotos by Billie Woods: http://cohencentric.com/2016/07/08/wedding-song-allison-crowes-small-masterwork

Checking in with nods to Andrew Marvell, Joni Mitchell, Janis Joplin, Lucinda Williams and Alicia Keys – our guide observes: “Turns out all the hype about about Allison’s vast tonal, thematic, and emotional range is true.” And, with another turn of phrase, unlocks this realization: “Once you’ve heard one Allison Crowe song, You’ve heard one Allison Crowe song.”

The First Noel

“The First Noel” - a favourite from the traditional Christmas canon.



Late one afternoon, Allison Crowe took her place at the piano and performed the songs of “Tidings” live-off-the-floor – captured on film in real-time by director/producer Alex Postowoi and his crew: camera-persons Karen Duthie, Randy Rotheisler, editor Shirley Claydon and interviewer Steven Rosenberg. The audio’s recorded by Larry Anschell at his Turtle Recording studios in White Rock, BC, Canada.

Crowe's much-loved versions of carols alongside tunes from the popular songbook, by Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell, The Beatles and more, have been viewed and heard by millions of people around the globe - every sex, race, religion and creed+ without boundaries or divisions.

It’s an historic session that nearly didn’t happen.

On the way from Vancouver to the studio near the Canada/US border, the large industrial van carrying the musician, film crew, and the lighting and camera gear broke down and had to be abandoned on the median.

Once bodies and equipment had been transferred into friends’ passenger vehicles, including a Volvo sedan so weighted down its undercarriage sparked as it grazed the tarmac, all arrived at Turtle late in the day for what had been booked for a morning call.

Engineer Anschell said had it been any artist other than Allison Crowe he’d have cancelled the session and looked to reschedule, as there was not the time available to set-up and film/record an album of song material. Knowing Allison, though, “Turtle” let things proceed – and, between sips of water and tea, she performed each song in a single, first, take. The full recording happened in the window it takes to enjoy these videos.

A Case of You

A Case of You from Allison Crowe on Vimeo.

Allison Crowe uncorks vintage “A Case of You” – off her “Sylvan Hour” album – with passion and artistry recognizing two great Canadian musical inspirations intertwined in the song – its writer, Joni Mitchell, and muse, Leonard Cohen. Cinematically, Frank Borzage directs the adaptation of Ernest Hemingway’s “A Farewell to Arms” –scenes hear featuring the film’s leading stars Helen Hayes, Gary Cooper and Adolphe Menjou.

Sylvan Hour Nears

“Sylvan Hour” arrives this Friday - May 1. Here’s the album’s front and back covers - and some word on a classic song collection:

 

 

Discover this music from a remarkable artist at a personal and creative crossroads in her life. “Sylvan Hour” is an album of songs bridging west and east, piano and guitar, then and now…

 

For fans of Allison Crowe at her purest, this is voice, one accompanying instrument – one take. Real-time performances in the sequence they’re played and sung by Allison in a log-home on Salt Spring Island, BC, Canada.

 

That afternoon the musician was in the midst of migrating from her birthplace of Nanaimo, BC, on Canada’s Pacific, to a new nest in Corner Brook, NL, on the Atlantic coast. Soon to fly east, Crowe bade farewell to those near and dear on western shores – including compatriot Kayla Schmah on Salt Spring, neighbouring Vancouver Island.

 

Decades earlier Schmah’s parents had made an epic trek to the Pacific Northwest from Central Canada – in a repurposed donut truck. Planting themselves in the Gulf Islands archipelago, they lived at first in a converted parachute in the woods. From the ground up the home-steaders then built a family dwelling out of Douglas Fir – their “sylvan castle”.

 

Allison and Kayla, as musicians had shared stages together from their teens onward (and, years later, becoming a film-scorer in Hollywood, Schmah brilliantly orchestrated and produced Crowe’s album “Spiral”.) Among the friends together on SSI this day was Ryan Adams (who, like Schmah was a recent graduate of Berklee College of Music and was en route to becoming an in-demand tv/film audio engineer in Los Angeles).

 

With mics and a laptop set-up in the living-room, Adams captured this set of the newest songs in Allison’s repertoire – originals including “Skeletons and Spirits”, “Running”, and “Silence” as well as a trio of covers (interpreting songs famously by Joni Mitchell, The Lovin' Spoonful and Aretha Franklin).

 

Also gorgeous, but differently so, essentially group versions of most of these songs were released near the end of that same year (2006) on Allison Crowe’s album “This Little Bird” (the title track a celebration of her migration). “I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You)” is the sole sylvan session recording released before – it’s presented now within the full hour of music for all time.

 

Enjoy this most natural of talents – in this most natural of settings.

 

Paddy McGinty's Goat

P’raps there is not yet a website for goat songs and lyrics – but there well could be – from Joni Mitchell’s “California” to Tom Cahill’s “Mobile Goat Song”- which featured last year on Allison Crowe’s first album of “Newfoundland Vinyl” songs – there’s plenty of music referencing the curious and clever creature to be herd… uh, heard.

“Paddy McGinty’s Goat” comes from the stable of the prolific English music hall+ songwriting team of R.P. Weston (1878 – 1936) and Bert Lee (1880 - 1946) – joined for this particular composition by Bob Adams and Bob Allen (aka “the two Bobs”). It was a worldwide hit for the Irish crooner, Val Doonican, in the swinging 1960s.

On the lovely isle of Newfoundland, it’s recorded by Jack Houlihan of Flat Rock, NL – a town with rich Irish heritage. It’s here now sung and played with characteristic kidding and joy by Corner Brook’s Allison Crowe on “Newfoundland Vinyl II”:

http://music.allisoncrowe.com/album/newfoundland-vinyl-ii

Alleyluja - Happy Birthday+!!! ~ November 16

“Hallelujah – you'll never guess what happens next!” ’s’how this might be tagged if it were ‘click-bait’. Instead, it is an affectionately playful bit of fun to share on November 16 in celebration of this 33rd birthday of Allison Crowe. Simply: “Alleyluja” :)

Born in Nanaimo, BC on Vancouver Island and home now, for years, in Corner Brook, on the island of Newfoundland, nests that span the great expanse of Canada, Allison Crowe is singular in so many ways.

Her gifts and talents as vocalist/instrumentalist, composer, lyricist, arranger, performer and more place her among the greats of popular music.

In concert, people come for her varied repertoire of originals – favourites such as “Disease”, “There Is”, “Skeletons and Spirits”, “Crayon and Ink”, “Whether I’m Wrong” and plenty other songs she’s created since the start of a career launched professionally more than half her lifetime ago.

Loved as well, Crowe is, for her peerless interpretations – be they sea shanties of Newfoundland, or vital covers of modern classics composed by Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, the Beatles, Phil Ochs, Ani, Tori, PJ or CCs…

Hear, in this bootleg from Firenze, Italy, from a concerto at Teatro del Sale, "Alleyluja".

          

For the Roses - Joni Mitchell Birthday Tribute

November 7 – today – we celebrate the birthday of Joni Mitchell, Renaissance woman of heart and mind.

 Joni’s “For the Roses” is performed by Allison Crowe in tribute.

"16 Songs" Video Album from Allison Crowe = Music + Movie Magic

"Soulful. Alive. Joyous. Grievous. Real, true, music is what I want to make."

 

That’s how Allison Crowe framed things near the start of this century before launching Rubenesque Records Ltd., one of the world’s truly independent music labels.

 

Through legendary live performances, broadcasts, and a dynamic oeuvre of recordings, globally-acclaimed and loved, Crowe’s distinguished herself among today’s finest songwriters, recording and concert acts, and as a supreme interpreter of popular song.

 

Combining versatility and virtuosity, the amazing Canadian musician transmits emotion into a visceral joy – sharing heart and soul with audiences.

 

Timeless artistic expression has its own tradition in Canada, a land plentifully represented by: wordsmiths & tunesmiths, Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, Gordon Lightfoot and Neil Young; by jazz pianist/composer Oscar Peterson; classical composer Marjan Mozetich; in theatre and opera – beautiful voices of Teresa Stratas, Richard Verreau, Léopold Simoneau; and other sublime standard-bearers.

 

Allison Crowe’s singularity carries her across the globe and into such company as the Master of the Queen’s Music, Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, Britain’s Poet Laureate, Carol Ann Duffy, and dates with Canada's Royal Winnipeg Ballet. Thrilling, fun, and moving, the Nanaimo, BC-born musician traverses Europe and North America from home-base in Corner Brook, Newfoundland earning hoorays even from Hollywood where appreciative movie Director Zack Snyder invited her to cameo in the latest Superman blockbuster.

 

Coming soon Allison Crowe releases “16 Songs” a video album reimagining century-spanning film, three decades of songwriting, and a dozen albums of modern music. Renowned for gorgeous, often ground-breaking, interpretations of Mitchell, Cohen, The Beatles, Pearl Jam +, Crowe’s set-list here is radiantly international, mixing original tunes (Disease, Circular Reasoning, Double-Edged Swords +) with covers of: Annie Lennox & Eurythmics, Radiohead, Tori Amos, Elton John & Bernie Taupin, Matthew Good, Hunters and Collectors.

 

"16 Songs" Video Album from Allison Crowe Coming Soon

 

We’ve recently witnessed novel approaches to twinning of music and video releases in the American mainstream. In December 2013, pop superstar Beyoncé paired a video with each of her album’s 14 new song tracks adding three bonus music videos all as part of the “Beyoncé” album physical release. Partial clips of the vids were posted online upon the album’s surprise launch.

 

This Summer “Weird Al” Yankovic built upon the model of his 2011 “Alpocalypse” album. For his July 2014 release, “Mandatory Fun”, pop music’s über-parodist-satirist-accordionist amped awareness by production-partnering with an array of web portals to release eight videos online the same week his album’s 12 music tracks became available.

 

Allison Crowe’s music videos for most of this millennium comprise, either, documentary, live-in-performance, films (eg. the hugely popular “Tidings” series from director Alex Postowoi’s cinéma vérité crew), or, audio recordings with ‘still’ images. The exceptions – a pair of music videos in narrative style - were both made in 2003: “Midnight” (also directed by Steadiman’s Postowoi), and “Scared” (from the transmission2media duo of Angela Kendall and Brian Dutkewich – known for their later work with musical twins Tegan and Sara).

 

Starting with 2011’s luminous “Arthur” – a song exploring love, memory and aging – Crowe’s videos also marry her song recordings with vintage footage from home-movies, silent films and classics of Georges Méliès, Dimitri Kirsanoff, Nadia Sibirskaia, Salvador Dali, Dominique Monfréy, Josef von Sternberg, D.W. Griffith plus other pioneers and visionaries of cinema (impressionists, surrealists, Dadaists, avant gardists, pop-artists+).

 

“The strange thing about cinema, and this would go for television film, is that no one really knows why music is needed. I would say after a lifetime in it I could not tell you why. But it is not complete without it… As a matter-of-fact, I may be bold enough to say that with very few exceptions, a piece of film, or a film cannot come to life without the help of music of some kind,” reflected composer Bernard Herrmann, a frequent collaborator with film director Alfred Hitchcock.

 

The “Master of Suspense”, Hitch himself, observed: “Art is emotion.”

 

“16 Songs” is an artful collection of Allison Crowe musical works with visuals from great creators and innovators - film-makers, animators, painters, photographers: Fernand Léger, Jean Vigo, Buster Keaton, Dave Fleischer & Max Fleischer, Edwin S. Porter, Man Ray, Hans Richter, Marcel Duchamp, Alexander Calder, Winsor McCay, Augusto Genina, René Clair & Georg W. Pabst. Iconic images and figures - Louise Brooks, Lois Lane and Clark Kent/Superman, Michel Simon, Dita Parlo, Jean Dasté, and Kiki de Montparnasse - populate the video album playlist.

 

“Oh, this is wonderful, it really is,” says Slovenia’s Milka of an advance screening, “I love it.” The art-aficionado from Izola comments: “It is marvellous amalgamation of Allison's voice and movie's poetry. Both benefit from each other and give a viewer another dimension for song's interpretation. While the movie, not known to me, suddenly takes me to place where one never ages. Love it.”

 

Curtains rise on Allison Crowe’s “16 Songs” video album daily from the New Moon of September 23 to the Full Moon of October 8, 2014. Visit your favourite online video portal to know how it feels.

Sing Out! In Our Global Village

‘The Leonard Cohen Files’ now lists 567 different cover versions of Leonard Cohen’s much-loved “Hallelujah” – recordings made in dozens of countries and numerous languages: http://www.leonardcohenfiles.com/coverlist.php 

“Hallelujah” is a popular song we’ve been able to widely and directly witness become a standard – as this process has occurred during, and, in part, thanks to, this age of the internet reaching near-ubiquity.

The global expanse of songs such as The Beatles’ “Yesterday”, (with some 3000 interpretations on record), and Joni Mitchell’s “Both Sides Now”, (nearing 1000 covers at latest count - http://jonimitchell.com/music/covers-most.cfm ), and most other tunes which have become standards in the canons of pop and rock – and many more in folk, jazz and other genres – has, largely, been a phenomenon experienced offline (and these songs grew into universal favourites not in our real-time view).

The introduction of “Hallelujah” to a mass audience – via such channels as 2001’s Hollywood hit animated film “Shrek” – has been augmented and amplified by the world wide web.

Music and video sites online enable songs to be shared around, enjoyed and learned – grassroots traditions of jam sessions, campfire sing-alongs, church choirs and other communal ways that music is transported, today can be propelled by the advance in technology (and digital devices, in hand, enable more people to make recordings).

Not only can people world-wide experience music more readily, and in greater richness and variety, than in pre-internet times, folks are now able to express what it all means to them and reflect back to the same giant community “so that all souls can see it”.

For myself, serving as manager to Allison Crowe, a musician creating in these exciting times, one of the profound pleasures now possible is regularly hearing how people are moved by music.

“Reflections on Hallelujah” @ http://blog.farmgirlwrites.com/2014/06/reflections-on-hallelujah.html - posted by Washington, DC-based blogger, “Farmgirl Writes”, is the sort of thing that inspires appreciation and understanding of a song and our fellow beings.

And, (especially for those with more dexterity and musical talent or dedication to this course than I), there’s such sites as “Chordify” – which show how we can play the music we love - http://chordify.net/chords/allison-crowe-hallelujah-live-in-the-studio-adrian22

“Joni Mitchell: In Her Own Words” – a new book that’s exactly what its title promises – Joni’s voice heard through a trio of decades-spanning interviews with her friend, artist and journalist, Malka Marom - is released this week (officially, September 9, 2014).

Allan Showalter, aka DrHGuy, offers a typically entertaining and enlightening post in review @ http://1heckofaguy.com/2014/09/03/book-review-joni-mitchell-talks-about-growing-up-art-songwriting-love-and-leonard-cohen

I’ve mentioned this previously in a post to my own (Adrian’s personal facebook) page and – not unrelated to L. Cohen, the nature of popular songs, their interpretation and sharing – this book includes choice commentary.

"River... Joni Mitchell's whole album Blue is timeless," Allison remarked when she covered the uniquely ever-green song on her own album “Tidings” in 2004.

And “River”, like “Hallelujah”, has witnessed an accelerated cultural expanse and embrace in these digital media times. Currently, Bob Muller, the Grand Poobah of Covers at JoniMitchell.com, tracks 402 different versions of Mitchell’s song @ http://jonimitchell.com/music/covers-most.cfm

The song established itself steadily over the decades – with some 200 covers being made from the time of its release on “Blue” in 1971 to 2007. In these last seven years, the total number of “River” covers has doubled.

In this new book, the brilliant singer, songwriter, composer, painter+ tells her confidante and interviewer: “There was a funny article in the L.A. Times. The guy was ranting, ‘Why are all these people covering Joni Mitchell’s ‘River’? It’s overexposed.’ That’s what he said, and I thought, ‘This person has no concept of what a standard is. A standard is a good song enjoyed by many.’ A lot of singers wanted to sing it, and it kept the song alive.”

Malka asks: “How do you feel when people sing your songs, any song, or play it completely different, like with ‘normal’ chords, and different arrangements?”

Joni says: “I think it’s great, I feel honoured. I like the idea of songs being sung. I like the idea that people who can’t even sing are singing them...” 

A Case of You's Blue Stroke of Genius

"Oh I am a lonely painter, I live in a box of paints" writes Joni Mitchell in "A Case of You" - a song reflecting on her relationship with fellow Canadian Leonard Cohen. Portugal's "reriz" is inspired to frame this cover, by yet another Canuck, with a dozen paintings of Kirk Hughey, Sante Fe, New Mexico artist now living in Paris, France.

In a palette rich with interpretations, as well as brilliant originals, here's another favourite from Allison Crowe. The original is on Joni's album "Blue". Allison's interpretation is on "This Little Bird"

River ~ "Tidings Concert" (song 2)

Should you have a "Blue" Christmas, here's a "River" you can skate away on... Allison Crowe's "Tidings Concert" lights up this musical evergreen from Joni Mitchell.

Dr. Heck's Holiday Prescription

The much-liebed "Heck of a Guy", a shining star in the universe of Leonard Cohen-centric blogs, is rockin' around the tree to the sounds of Allison Crowe's just-released "Tidings Concert" album. Listening is invited: "if you’re into something more enthusiastically, gleefully, contagiously joyous... welcome home".



Tidings Concert video playlist

New album, concert tour, and documentary film come a'pealing

It’s coming on “Tidings” – and that means the voice of Allison Crowe will soon ring out traditional favourites, Christmas carols such as “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear”, “In the Bleak Midwinter”, and “The First Noel”, alongside the modern canon of Joni Mitchell, Patty Griffin, Lennon & McCartney and original song selections including the elegiac “Arthur”, and the epic, foot-stomping, “Disease”.

Allison’s just off the road, wrapping up her second engagement of this year with Canada’s amazing Royal Winnipeg Ballet – performing songs of Leonard Cohen. With the love experienced on the dance stage, as well as recent European concert dates and this Summer’s Gros Morne Theatre Festival hit, “Newfoundland Vinyl”, still touching souls – it’s time to rally a repertoire that decks us all in comfort and joy whatever life’s circumstances.

"Allison Crowe is a stunningly talented performer. Her voice celebrates the music with a bluesy rock-gospel intensity; her controlled vibrato, silken rasp, and powerful projection rivet your attention. This is no casual background music... be prepared to be amazed," says Carol Swanson (ChristmasReviews).

Drawing themes of faith, hope, sorrow, joy, redemption, transcendence and more from an abundant well of music, this year, there’s plenty of ways to rejoice with Allison as she melds the sacred and secular in "songs of the season" and spirit.

“Tidings Concert”, captured truly by Engineer and Mixer Brad Graham, and FOH Engineer Ed Johnson, and mixed at Turtle Recording in White Rock, BC, Canada is released on November 25 (debuting @ http://music.allisoncrowe.com/album/tidings-concert with some days grace for iTunes and other folks observing Thanksgiving this weekend). This album set, her eighth full-length collection, features 19 in-concert performances, and, for the first time, audio from Crowe’s “Hallelujah” video which now has a worldwide audience of greater than 10 million people (more than eight million genuine views on YouTube alone).

Right after this music release, Allison embarks on a “Tidings” concert tour allied with special guests and special causes:

NOVEMBER 29 – Campbell River, BC, Canada - St. Peter's Anglican Church – featuring The Campbell River Childrens Choir's "Zephyr" w. Director Barbara Prowse and accompanist Judy Melny – presented by Rockin’ Ron Nicolaye to aid Campbell River Hospice Society & CR Food Bank

DECEMBER 1 – Victoria, BC, Canada - Fairfield United Church – with guest artist, singer-songwriter, Billie Woods - to aid Artemis Place, (girls' educational and life-skills), and HepCBC

DECEMBER 5 – Nanaimo, BC, Canada - Old City Quarter – Community Carol Sing-along in support of "Light up a Life" campaign for Haven Society

DECEMBER 8 – Nanaimo, BC, Canada - St. Andrew's United Church - with a cavalcade of Vancouver Island's finest young musical talent: Chelsea Peckett, Daniel Knapp, Paige Hughes, Raymond Salgado, Kaleigh Hargrove & Emily Blake - to aid The Mind's Eye (youth newspaper) + Woodlands SS Band and Basketball programs

DECEMBER 14 – Corner Brook, NL, Canada - Arts and Culture Centre - Tidings fun barrels down the chimney in this caring and creative Atlantic community

DECEMBER 15 – Corner Brook, NL, Canada - Arts and Culture Centre - World Premiere screenings of the Peter Buckle-directed documentary ~ "A Corner Brook Tidings" – a film featuring Allison Crowe and you – created with gracious assistance of the Newfoundland and Labrador Arts Council (NLAC)

Fuller details @ http://www.allisoncrowe.com/tour.html – and plenty more to come!

Allison Crowe Brings Tidings 2011 from St. John's to Victoria

It's coming on the season to celebrate with one of the great voices in popular music.


Expect plenty of rocking holiday cheer, laced with overtones of Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell, The Beatles and more when Allison Crowe delivers "Tidings". The 2011 edition of Crowe's annual holiday favourite begins in St. John's, NL, the eastern terminus of the Trans-Canada Highway, and wraps in Victoria, BC, the western terminus.

The internationally-acclaimed musician, born on Vancouver Island, and home in Newfoundland for years now, stirs together traditional Christmas carols and holiday favourites with an organic blend of rock, jazz, folk, gospel and soul. "Be prepared to be amazed," chimes ChristmasReviews.com Longtime NPR broadcaster Ross Hocker calls Allison Crowe's show, "The most honest, heartfelt, and directly intimate concert in my entire life."

Italian radio calls Allison Crowe "Una voce incredibile per una forza della natura."

As a performing artist, Crowe is akin, in ways, to the late, great, Swedish power-house soprano, Birgit Nilsson, about whom it's said "No record or CD could quite prepare a listener for the real thing, live in the opera house".

Tidings is Allison Crowe's melding of the sacred and secular in "songs of the season" and spirit. Some of the music is familiar repertoire, delivered in singular style. Some is not like anything customarily heard in a holiday-time concert.

Tidings viscerally surveys a musical terrain of carols - It Came Upon a Midnight Clear, In the Bleak Midwinter, What Child Is This, First Noel, Silent Night, O Holy Night - performed with rare artistry and passion, and emotive arrangements, alongside the modern canon of Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell, Lennon/McCartney+, and Allison Crowe's original songs, (including the just-composed "Arthur", and the epic "Disease"), that draw on themes of faith, hope, sorrow, joy, redemption, transcendence and more from life's well.

First staged in 2003, Tidings is an exciting experience shared by music-lovers around the world. This holiday season, Allison Crowe, with some very special musical guests, brings Tidings to:

St. John's, NL - D.F. Cook Recital Hall - November 25

Corner Brook, NL - First United Church - December 2

Nanaimo, BC - St. Andrew's United Church - December 10 - Featuring: Christopher Wood; Raymond Salgado; Kiana Smith; Kaleigh Hargrove; Taylor Manns; Emily Blake & Guests to aid The Mind's Eye + Woodlands SS Band and Basketball programs

Vancouver, BC - St. Jame's Hall - December 11 - Featuring guest artist: Juniper Watters

Campbell River, BC - St. Peter's Anglican Church - Dec. 15 - Featuring: The Campbell River Childrens Choir with Director Barbara Prowse to aid Campbell River Hospice Society & CR Food Bank

Victoria, BC - Fairfield United Church - Dec. 17 (NB a shift from original date of Dec. 9) - Featuring guest artists: Haley Walker; & Billie Woods to aid Artemis Place, (girls' educational and life-skills), and HepCBC

On Thursday, December 22, you can join Allison Crowe in her birth-place of Nanaimo, B.C. for the "Light Up a Life" Sing-along - part of the campaign for Haven Society organized by the Old City Quarter Merchants.

Full details of the "Tidings" concerts and sing-along will be posted @ allisoncrowe.com

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Just came upon another thougtful post from boyhowdy on his Cover Lay Down blog - this one celebrating Canadian Thanksgiving with a bounty of Canadiana music - including Allison Crowe's cover of Joni Mitchell's "A Case of You". Have a good one, eh!