Tamblyn, Ian - Raincoast

Tracks

		Track Name	Length
	1	The Gift Left on the Shore
	2	Woodsmoke and Oranges
	3	Black Spruce
	4	Northern Journey
	5	Slate Island Song
	6	Higher Plane
	7	That Boxcar in Algoma
	8	Northlands of Ontario
	9	Northern Town
	10	Fly with your Heart
	11	All That Remains
	12	Hometown
	13	The Birch Canoe
	14	Campfire Light

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Information/Write-up

Raincoast is the second in a series of CDs called the Four Coast project. The first Superior: Spirit and Light was released in June 2007 and garnered much critical acclaim and was nominated for best CD at the Canadian Folk Music Awards for 2007.

Raincoast is a song cycle about the Northwest coast of British Columbia and Alaska – actually the thin band of tremendous biodiversity and culture known as the raincoast that stretches from the intertidal zone to the coastal mountains- from the Gulf Islands to Gulf of Alaska. It is spectacularly beautiful part of the world and is exceedingly rich in marine life , forests and in the cultural wealth of First Nation people who live along the coast.

I started touring on the west coast of Canada in the early 1980’s playing gigs in Victoria, the Gulf islands, and then all the towns up island to Port Hardy. A concert at the marine station in Bamfield changed the course of my life as I was asked there to join a scientific team that took me from the Arctic to Antarctic. More on that later. From Porty Hardy I took the ferry to Ocean Falls, Bella Bella, Prince Rupert and then to Haida Gwaii. All along the way we stopped in even smaller towns, First Nation villages, fish canneries – mist rising from the moss- covered cannery roof, First Nation chiefs in full finery greeting the ferry. It was another world and in some ways another time. Since those days I have had the privilege of traveling the coast many times, sometimes as a guide in the company of Robert Davidson, Cecil Paul, Roy Vickers, Robert Bateman or David Suzuki, listening to their insights on the raincoast. Other times I was working with a group of scientists studying sea otters near Kodiak Is. or studying the bio diversity of the Misty Fiord region of South east Alaska. Throughout this period I wrote many songs that find themselves in new settings on this recording. In recent years I have written nine new songs about this part of the world and they have found their way onto this recording as well

This CD is a journey from south to north, stories from the raincoast, stories of the landscape, and stories of the people who live along the coast. The journey is rain soaked and mist shrouded, it is a journey of verdant forests and, it is a journey through clear cuts and salmon depleted streams. It is a log drum heard in a long house in Alert Bay, a humpback breaching off South Morseby, a male orca cutting the surface near Telegraph Cove, an oyster man on Cortes Island. I hope you will enjoy the journey.

July 2007

I am pleased to announce the release of Superior : Spirit and Light , the first of four CDs called the Four Coast project. Lake Superior and northwest Ontario is the focus of this first CD in the series. In the next two years I will look at the Pacific Northwest coast, The Arctic and Labrador/ Newfoundland coast.

I chose to begin with Superior because, in many ways that where my creative and musical journey began and the reference point for all subsequent journeys. I grew up in Fort William and camped on the shores of Thunder Bay and had a relationship with the lake but I rediscovered its power , its vastness ,beauty and spirit when I began canoeing the north shore in the early 1970’s . It was also the time when my musical journey began.

Now – some thirty –five years later I am going back. I think it is time to present a body of work that has emerged regarding the big lake and its surrounding environs. Though I will continue to present other journeys, both inner and outer- I feel a compulsion now to gather together this collection of songs that have dotted various albums and CDs but never been together. As I wrote these songs over the years they were always part of an ongoing story, connected chords and plotlines. It was also a chance to re- record some tunes that have grown or morphed over the years , present some of my favourite work on the topic by others, and also bring several new songs to the studio.

The second reason for presenting Superior :Spirit and Light at this time is to focus attention on the lake and its surrounding communities .These communities are suffering from the depletion of natural resources , fluctuating lake levels , a continued neglect of First Nation reserves ,in fact , a general neglect of Northwestern Ontario. At times I feel this stunning part of Canada seems far more remote and removed than anywhere else in Canada. It seems to me many of the towns along Superior’s north shore will soon be ghost towns. It makes me sad and angry to bear witness to these events.

When I grew up in Fort William (Thunder Bay ) I came to believe it was one of the most dramatic and dynamic towns in the world . There were all kinds of comings and goings, it was in the centre of North America, its was at the head of the Great Lakes , it was an international port , ships from all over the world visited the port . It had a dynamic history, it was the centre of Northwestern Ontario’s seemingly endless natural resources. It hummed with a rough industrial energy. It was also in the middle of nowhere, long stretches of highway and rail -days from other towns of any size. This isolation also contributed to the creative dynamic I felt existed there. It still does, though the dynamic now threatens to be more entropic as Fort William fades and withers.

And then there was the lake – at first threatening , dark and dangerous but as I came to know its shoreline- powerful , awe inspiring , inspirational and spiritual . As I explored further I came to realize others had also found power and inspiration in what Glenn Gould came to note as this “Idea of North” – First Nation reverence of lake, the voyageurs, Group of Seven, Bill Mason , Wayland Drew , Norval Morreseau. What was the haunted quality of Superior’s north shore, why was it so compelling? Was there some spirit of north that simply existed in the rock and trees, lakes and vistas of the north shore? In the mid – seventies I started playing folk festivals and discovered kindred spirits in Northern Ontario in the likes of Andre Paiement , Marcel Aymar, Robert Pacquette, Robert Dixon, Daisy DeBolt and CANO. They were writing about the same spirit, the same energy. All these things lead me on a long journey, seeking out the places where the spirit of north and their attendant stories seemed to burst from the rocks, lakes and trees.

From Lake Superior , the journey continues to the North west coast of British Columbia, Haida Gwaii, the Gulf of Alaska , Bering and Chukchi Sea , Northwest Passage, Ellesmere ,Baffin , Hudson Bay , Greenland , Swalbord ,Spitsbergen, Franz Josef Land , Torngats, Labrador coast. Chasing the north is what this four coast project is all about. I hope you will enjoy the journey.

Ian Tamblyn
Chelsea, Québec - 2007

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