http://www.kansas.com/2010/08/13/144...-sails-on.html
Posted on Fri, Aug. 13,
Singer Lightfoot sails on
The veteran performer will appear at the Cotillion Sunday night.
By Steve Palisin
Myrtle Beach Sun-News
Gordon Lightfoot charts a new course whenever he sings "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald."
The Canadian musical poet, who performs Sunday night at the Cotillion, has revised some lyrics amid new historical data.
His chilling ballad from 1976, about an iron-ore freighter that sank in November 1975 after crossing Lake Superior in nearly hurricane-force winds, had referred to the longtime officially recognized cause: unclosed hatches that caved in. A TV documentary earlier this year, though, surmised that a massive "rogue wave" probably toppled the ship.
Speaking by phone from home in Toronto, Lightfoot said he has revised the hatch line in the song.
"Unfortunately, I can't change a line in what's already recorded," he said, "but certainly I've been doing it with the new line ever since this news came out."
Thinking back to the time of the tragedy, Lightfoot said when such vessels sank in the Great Lakes, they didn't stay in national news for long.
"When the Edmund Fitzgerald sank," he said, "there was a Newsweek article, and really, that's all there was, and a couple of news articles the next day, and that was it."
Lightfoot's ensuing melodic tribute to the ship's 29-man crew bound for Cleveland endured some editing to keep it sailing as a single for pop-radio play. He said after meeting with his then-record label, he and producers cut the instrumental component in half.
"We did that by taking eight bars of the middle of the instrumental part, shortening the song to four minutes and 20 seconds, and never losing any of the lyrics."
Speaking of the Edmund Fitzgerald's destination, Lightfoot, 71, said that's where he made his U.S. debut performance, at age 23 in the middle of July.
"Le Cave in Cleveland was really well known, one of the main folk clubs in America," he said of the long-defunct venue.
Before topping pop charts in the 1970s with "If You Could Read My Mind," "Sundown," and "Carefree Highway," Lightfoot had penned hits the previous decade for Peter, Paul & Mary and Marty Robbins.
He said he started writing music while in high school, and that led to work in copying orchestral lead sheets by hand in ink.
Asked if he sees folk music as one continuous movement from generation to generation, Lightfoot replied, "It's always there."
He said Toronto boasts quite a collection of young folk artists, one of whom "plays uke on three to four strings," the best he's heard on that instrument since he was in Hawaii.
"It's like a melting pot here," Lightfoot said, noting he likes to attend concerts and share his thoughts with the performers and record companies.
"I respect the new stuff as much as I respect the old stuff. It changes. They're looking for those new acts all the time," he said.
If you go
gordon lightfoot
What: Canadian singer/songwriter
Where: Cotillion Ballroom, 11120 W. Kellogg
When: 8 p.m. Sunday
How much: Tickets $35-$85, available at Select-A-Seat outlets, the Cotillion, House of Sight & Sound and employee clubs, unless otherwise noted. Credit card orders,
www.thecotillion.com or 316-722-4201.
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http://www.kansas.com/2010/08/13/144...#ixzz0wrgJjNjo
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