Remembering Ian Tyson
I just read that Ian Tyson passed away a couple weeks ago at the age of 89. If you don't know him, and was part of an extremely popular Canadian folk duo, Ian & Sylvia, who were very big in the 1960s and early 1970s during the folk music boom. Among their best-known songs that they wrote and performed (which many others have performed) were "Four Strong Winds" (that was probably their signature song), "You Were On My Mind" and my personal favorite "Someday Soon."
Some today may not know of Ian and Sylvia, but if you've seen the film, A Mighty Wind -- an affectionate spoof and homage to folk music made by Christopher Guest and the group who did Waiting for Guffman and Best in Show -- I have to believe that the core storyline with Eugene Levy and Catherine O'Hara as the estranged "Mitch & Mikey" reuniting, that had to have been based on Ian & Sylvia. The real-life couple had been married, but broke up the partnership and divorced in 1975. And then in 1986, they had a big reunion concert on TV with guests like Judy Collins, Emmylou Harris and Linda Ronstadt.
This below is, as I said, my favorite of their songs is "Someday Soon," but not their recording. Oddly, I like other versions more. In large part because it's about a young girl singing about her true love, a wandering rodeo performer -- but rather than Sylvia singing the lead, Ian did. My only guess is they did it that way because it was very personal to Ian who wrote it and had been a rodeo performer early in his career before an injury forced him to quit. And he probably just wanted to sing the lead. But I think it's still an odd choice.
Judy Collins had a very big hit with the song in 1969, five years after Ian & Sylvia released the original -- and sings it with them on the reunion concert. But my favorite version is performed by Suzy Bogguss who also had a big hit with it 22 years later. (Not bad, three hit versions of a song.) So, that's the one we'll go with.
But I can't honor Ian Tyson without a video of him and Sylvia Tyson at the reunion concert. This is the finale, with them singing their signature number, "Four Strong Winds." And about three minutes in, they're joined on staged by Murray McLaughlan, Judy Collins, Gordon Lightfoot and Emmylou Harris.
(It says it's six minutes, but that includes the closing credits of the show. Though the credit are worth watching because they're interspersed by the duo sitting together and discussing the reunion.)
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