Gordon Lightfoot Concert

Tonight was one evening I’ll never forget! We went to see Gordon Lightfoot in concert.

Gordon Lightfoot was a big feature in the soundtrack of my life. I grew up listening to Gordon Lightfoot in our family van with my dad driving, along with cassettes from Simon and Garfunkel, Neil Diamond, and Roger Whittaker.

I was hesitant to see him play live. I knew he was getting older (he’s 75!), and his voice wasn’t what it once was, but what a treasure! I’m so glad we went!

He opened the show by saying “The rumours of my demise have been greatly exaggerated” revering to the Twitter hoax in 2010 that I fell for.

He played for over 2 hours tonight, with his 4 member band. I heard so many of his old classics, and many newer ones from his later albums. I can’t believe I just saw Gordon Lightfoot play The Edmund Fitzgerald live! It reminded me of the time Jeff and I went to Whitefish Point Shipwreck Museum where the bell from the ship is (see blog post) and they played that song every 15 minutes.

As a true story teller, he often spoke a few words between songs to share what the next song was about, or who he wrote the song for.

His encore of Early Morning Rain was one time I wish the band didn’t join in so fast. Gord grabbed his 12 string acoustic guitar, “Old Betsy” I think he called it, and started into that song, playing it like time has stood still since he first wrote it. I would have loved to hear just Gordon Lightfoot and his 12 string. The other times the band made the most beautiful music to accompany Gordon that it didn’t surprise me to read later tonight that they’ve been with him for years.

He’s doing quite a significant tour, so if you want to catch a glimpse of Gordon and listen to his folk music masterpieces, here is a link to his 2014 Tour dates:

http://www.lightfoot.ca/2014.htm