Some songs, like Tom T. Hall’s “I Love,” unintentionally demonstrate that there’s a fine line between sincerity and satire. Some people maybe find the song to be a simple presentation of a […]
The Grascals, “Before Breakfast”
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The Wailin Jennys, “Fifteen”
The Wailin Jennys is one of those groups that causes lots of people to fall all over themselves with praise. And they’re absolutely right to. Truly, you can’t say enough good things […]
Andy Hall and Roosevelt Collier, “Let the Steel Play”
Remember Josh Graves? How about Tut Taylor? Or Paul Franklin? For anyone other than guitar geeks the names conjure something like memories, if not quite formed enough to warrant the term. They […]
Bela Fleck, Abigail Washburn, “Echo in the Valley”
One of the delightful moments is this recording is in the 5th track, when both segue into a lovely take on Bela Fleck’s “Big Country.” It’s a tune he’s presented himself a […]
Volume Five, “Milestones”
When people who are really into wine talk about wine they don’t tend to speak in generalities, but rather a whole range of specifics. They talk about the hints of this and […]
Students praise Lakefield College School for Outdoor Ed program
“I thought, ‘this is the place where I could be the best version of myself.’” for Ourkids.net One of Betsy Macdonnell’s first glimpses of life at Lakefield College School was a grade […]
This camp will change your life
Learning confidence, leadership, and life skills at Quebec’s Camp Nominingue for OurKids.net by Glen Herbert Not every Rhodes Scholar has been to Camp Nominingue, but at least one has. Colin Robertson got […]
Life lessons
For OurKids.net If there is a rock star in the world of Canadian camping, it’s Jocelyn Palm. She’s directed Glen Bernard Camp since 1977, though her leadership has extended well beyond that […]
Welcome to Canada, Welcome to camp
(for Our Kids) “They made me do the presentation twice,” says Tanya Springer. “[They were] gasping at each and every picture of a lake or sunset. They each had things they were […]
Mile Twelve’s “Onwards”
Sam Bush once said that Bill Monroe was the ultimate feel player. It’s a backhanded compliment in a way, despite Bush’s clear reverence, because what he was saying was that Monroe […]
Navigating the gap year
Neuchâtel Junior College (for OurKids.net) At its simplest, a gap year is a non-academic year between high school graduation and enrollment at university. It’s becoming more common, and more structured, though the […]
Students praise LCS outdoor education program
By Glen Herbert for OurKids.net One of Betsy Macdonnell’s first glimpses of life at Lakefield College School was a grade 9 outdoor education class, one of the stops on her first tour […]
Jim Kweskin and Geoff Muldaur, “Penny’s Farm”
You’ll be forgiven if you groan a bit when you see the track listing of this new release from Jim Kweskin and Geoff Muldaur, “Penny’s Farm.” Like right there. Did you breathe […]
Courtney Marie Andrews’ “Honest Life”
This is a brilliant release in all kinds of ways. Musicianship, arrangement, recording. Each one of those is wonderfully on display. It’s there in the details, such as the strings entering on […]
Ashes
When I arrived at my mother’s house she was still getting ready. I asked if I could take the things out to the car. There were three boxes of clothes—some of which […]
Making moonshine with Roger Lee “Buck” Nance
by Glen Herbert “Listen,” says Nance. “It sounds like rain on a roof.” And it really does. Large vats line the room, each filled with a roiling mixture of grain and yeast. […]
We’re here. Get used to it.
(for CBC Kids) Steve Colbert once said that stay-at-home dads are “against nature’s laws.” Your grandmother probably thinks that, too. The world that we know today is, of course, different than that […]
Living in the moment with Adolphous Greely
Twenty-five men, 350 pounds of supplies, and a chance to change the world. by Glen Herbert “This was not simply some new Arctic expedition,” says historian Michael Robinson, “this was really an […]
Sam Bush’s, “Storyman”
(Published by Hudson Valley Bluegrass) Sam Bush is such a perennial of Americana music, from first gaining lots of attention with Newgrass Revival, going on to be the King of Telluride … […]
Arnie Naiman’s, “My Lucky Stars”
Published in Penguin Eggs, Issue #71, Fall 2016 You’ve got to love this album, and I’ll tell you why. Look at the liner notes. Each song lists the people that join Naiman, […]
Dave Pomfret’s, A Devil’s Urge
I’m forever being impressed with the level, variety, and quality of music coming out of Hamilton. The city doesn’t have the reputation of Cape Breton or Nashville, New Orleans or Muscle Shoals, […]
Martin Harley and Daniel Kimbro, “Live at Southern Ground”
This isn’t a live album in the way that you think: it’s live in the sense of two musicians playing together, no overdubs or added tracks. There’s less audience noise than […]
Joe Ely, “Panhandle Rambler”
The panhandle of the title is the Texan one, not the Floridian, and the album comprises a something of a tour of the writers and the styles that we associate with […]
Boarding school
(For OurKids.net) Before the Golden Goal, or the Stanley Cup win, or the NHL draft, Sidney Crosby was a student at boarding school, something that many Canadians may find surprising. But he […]
The Noisy Locomotive
published in Penguin Eggs, issue #69 On the face of it, Ben Nesrallah is the height of improbability. He’s 26 years old, has grown up in Montreal, and he plays old-time music in […]
It’s personal
When it comes to alternative education, is it possible to go too far? All advances in education are emblematic of their time, arising out of a specific political context and cultural experience. […]
Sierra Hull’s “Weighted Mind”
Innovation has long been an important part of the musical endeavour, and it’s often the first person to happen upon a new idea—rather than the people who refine it—that remains foremost in […]
“Girl”
Winning Entry, Massey Lectures contest Margaret MacMillan’s 2015 CBC Massey Lectures were about people who have left a mark on their own time, and on ours. Inspired by the lectures, listeners were asked: Who you think will […]
Ronnie Reno’s “Lessons Learned”
Ronnie Reno is, I hate to say it, one of the last of a dying breed. He began his career in music at age 8, and while he’s spent a lot of […]
The Steep Canyon Rangers, “Radio”
Since they began, there has been a goofy quality to the Steep Canyon Rangers, though in a good way. They were five young people with good hygiene, great senses of humor, and […]
The Steeldrivers, “The Muscle Shoals Recordings”
Muscle Shoals, Alabama, is the place that musicians have travelled to when they wanted to change, to sound different. Aretha Franklin went to Muscle Shoals as an unknown pop singer who had […]
Rethinking Appalachia
Phil Jamison Hoedowns, Reels and Frolics: Roots and branches of Southern Appalachian Dance University of Illinois Press (For Sing Out! magazine) Alex Ross wrote recently in the New Yorker that “when classical-music fans hear that […]
Alive! In Concert! with Dailey and Vincent!
(for HVBA) It’s hard to be a Dailey and Vincent fan because they can be so unabashedly shameless. Where other bluegrass musicians grew up wanting to be like Bill, or Earl, or […]
Living in the moment with Adolphous Greely
“This was not simply some new Arctic expedition,” says historian Michael Robinson, “this was really an attempt at a new science of the world.” It was the international polar year, and fourteen…
The Honey Dewdrops’ “Tangled Country”
(Penguin Eggs, issue #66) The Honey Dewdrops (Laura Wortman and Kagey Parris) have been around for a while now, perhaps flying a bit below the radar. In that time, Laura’s cut her […]
Doodling with Darwin’s children
by Glen Herbert Charles Darwin is the father of natural selection, but he was also the father of ten children, eight of whom survived infancy. Three of his surviving sons were knighted, and…
Anna and Elizabeth
(KDHX) Folk music is a lot more like golf than you might think, were you ever to think this kind of thing. The more muscle you put into it, the more erratic […]
Le vent du nord
(For Sing Out! magazine) I suspect that the Quebecois band Le Vent du Nord is unfamiliar to many in the English-speaking world. Which is too bad, because they are exceptionally skilled, exceptionally […]
Growing up
by Glen Herbert Looking at the current listing for Adult Contemporary within the Billboard Charts you’ll find two Taylor Swift singles along with songs from Meghan Trainor and Ed Sheeran. “Uptown Funk!”…
Ralph Waldo Emerson on living with intent
by Ralph Waldo Emerson Living with intent may prove to be the coin of the year, bumping mindfulness out of the bestseller lists. Both, of course–and indeed all the other topics under “well-being”…
What we eat
Fear of Food: A History of Why We Worry about What We Eat by Harvey Levenstein Chicago Press, 2012 by Glen Herbert Whenever we talk about food, whether it’s just that or a…
Reading Disability
It’s discouraging to think that, since the Wizard of Oz was released as a feature film, the foremost image in North Americans’ minds of dwarfism has been the lollipop kids. Comical, childish, awkward, short—it…
Beyond borders
The following is an excerpt from Caring for Women, Changing Lives, a report written for the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at McMaster University. Working Beyond Borders McMaster as a centre for […]
Making moonshine with Roger Lee “Buck” Nance
by Glen Herbert “Listen,” says Nance. “It sounds like rain on a roof.” And it really does. Large vats line the room, each filled with a roiling mixture of grain and yeast.…
Being there: Norman Blake on a new recording and a long career
(published in Penguin Eggs magazine, issue #65) “It’s kind of a downer if you listen to the words,” says Norman Blake about his new album, titled Wood, Wire and Words. He’s having […]
Emmylou Harris, Rodney Crowell, “The Travelling Kind”
by Glen Herbert (For KDHX radio) There’s a scene in the first season of Nashville where Rayna James approaches a young rock producer to make her next album. She’s only written […]
Classic American Ballads from Smithsonian Folkways
Update: Since I posted the review below, Jeff Place, an archivist at Smithsonian Folkways, was in touch to note that I’m confusing the Library of Congress Collections with those of the Smithsonian. […]
The universe in stone: An interview with Mark Wilson
(for Patriarch) This is how professor Mark Wilson describes the specimen pictured above: “The platform is the wavy outer layer of a bivalve shell. Attached to it are encrusting organisms (sclerobionts). The […]
Your album sucks …
We read a lot of reviews in the popular press, be they for movies, or books, or music. And there was a time when we knew what they were for, or at […]
The Chrysalids at 60
(for Patriarch) Sixty years ago this year, John Wyndham published a post-apocalyptic thriller about, well, you know, kids with telepathy. Which sounds funny, because as much as that’s true, the book has resonated […]
