Gordon Lightfoot, the Canadian folk-rock musician has died, aged 84.
Lightfoot, whom many Canadians affectionately called “Gord,” was passionate about music as a boy in Orillia, Ontario, and his mother encouraged his talent.
He sang for local churches, radio shows and music festivals and at 12 won a contest and appeared at Toronto’s legendary Massey Hall.
His songs were recorded by U.S. musicians like Johnny Cash, Elvis Presley, Harry Belafonte and Peter, Paul and Mary. “I can’t think of any Gordon Lightfoot song I don’t like. Every time I hear a song of his, it’s like I wish it would last forever,” Bob Dylan once said.
Many of those songs were personal. He described ‘If You Could Read My Mind’, written during his first divorce, as ‘a song about the failure of marriage’. ‘Sundown’, his only No. 1 single in the U.S., was inspired by a troubled romance.
He turned to fiction and history in tunes like ‘Don Quixote’ and ‘The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald’. The latter was about a freighter that sank in 1975 in Lake Superior, killing the 29-man crew, was inspired by an article in Newsweek.
He also wrote about Canada in songs like ‘Christian Island (Georgian Bay)’ and ‘Alberta Bound’. ‘Canadian Railroad Trilogy’, a 6½-minute ballad about building the Canadian Pacific Railway in the late 19th century, was arguably his masterpiece.