"Sunny & warm weather forecast for tomorrow... Beautiful day for Gordon Lightfoot to be in town, look on the papers photo how friendly he looks"!
What A Guy ! 
http://timestranscript.canadaeast.co...rticle/1004705
Gordon Lightfoot takes Coliseum stage
Published Friday April 2nd, 2010
Latest tour by iconic Canadian singer lands in Moncton tomorrow night
By BRETT ANNINGSON
Times & Transcript Staff
Gordon Lightfoot was rumoured to have died last February.
Arnie Lee/Times & Transcript
Gordon Lightfoot
Showing the dangerous side of social media, rumours of his death originated on Twitter and then spread to Facebook and became viral from there.
Lightfoot was travelling to work in his car when he heard news of his death on the radio. He immediately phoned the station to set the record straight.
At 71, Lightfoot is alive, well and on the road for his latest tour of Canada, bringing his signature folk music to the stage. His show lands at the Moncton Coliseum tomorrow night.
After health troubles in 2002 which forced him to cancel part of his tour, Lightfoot bounced back two years later to release 'Harmony,'his 20th studio album.
The next year he was inducted into the Canadian Music Industry Hall of Fame and launched a 30-city tour.
Then in 2006 he suffered a transient stroke on stage and could not feel his fingers enough to play the guitar.
He continued the tour a few days later.
Lightfoot took the stage for a recent concert in Toronto and, 10 minutes into a set, looked out at the audience and quoted Mark Twain, saying, "Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated."
Something for which his fans are eternally grateful.
Lightfoot really came into his own as a folk and country singer in the 1960s; but his most loved hits began to top the charts in the 70s with classics like 'If You Could Read My Mind,' 'Sundown,' 'Carefree Highway,' and of course 'The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.'
The list of artists who have recorded their own versions of Lightfoot's songs is astounding; people like Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Marty Robbins, Jerry Lee Lewis, Bob Dylan, Barbra Streisand, Johnny Mathis, Harry Belafonte, and even Sarah McLachlan and John Mellencamp.
He was born in Orillia, the son of a manager for a dry cleaning firm, and really got his start singing in the church choir of the St. Paul's United Church in Orillia. He later found himself performing on local radio, and in local operettas and music festivals.
Lightfoot taught himself guitar in high school and then headed off for the fame and fortune of California.
He studied jazz composition and orchestration for two years at Hollywood's Westlake College of Music, at the same time making money by writing and arranging commercial jingles.
In 1960 he returned to Canada and began to perform with The Swinging Eight, a group featured on TV's Country Hoedown. By 1962 he earned a following in and around Toronto and decided to release two singles, which were played a lot in the city, and a little bit in the rest of the country.
In 1965, Lightfoot signed a management contract with Albert Grossman, who also represented Bob Dylan. That same year, he signed a recording contract with United Artists and released his own version of "I'm Not Saying" as a single.
However, in 1970 he changed record labels and it was under Warner Brothers' Reprise that he had his first major hit with "If You Could Read My Mind."
The rest, as they say, is history.
By the 1990s he was mostly touring, giving just 50 concerts a year by 1998, mainly in North America, while he released two albums in the period.
Lightfoot has won 15 Juno Awards and been nominated for 5 Grammy Awards. He was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 1986 and the Canadian Country Music Hall Of Fame in 2001. In May 2003, he was made a Companion of the Order of Canada and is also a member of the Order of Ontario. In 2004 was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Singer Robbie Robertson calls him a "national treasure."
A "National Treasure" takes Coliseum stage !
thanks for the fabulous write-up!
