Rita MacNeil was one of the old time favorites from my parent's generation. She sang with miners from Cape Breton, some who were related to my father. He always got a kick out of the fact that she didn't wear shoes on stage when she sang. She must have had feet like an east coast fisher woman.
She always connected with Canadians, especially the ordinary people who came to listen to her sing. Her songs were about older times, rural times when men worked hard in the mines and one the sea and the women worked and worried just as much on land. It's very Atlantic Canadian but translated across the country. It seemed Rita was touring the country non-stop. I have seen her at Christmas with my parents (I wanted to shoot myself) She is famous for singing onstage with a men's choir called the Men of the Deep and comprised of actual coal miners.
But my favorite Rita MacNeil moment had to have come from the Trailer Park Boys. They need people to help them harvest their crop of weed before it's discovered so they take over Rita's tour bus and there she was...
Rita played along. Rita got the joke. She always seemed genuinely thrilled that people came to watch her sing and she sang like an angel. She was safe to be on CBC and her many specials are the very essence of Canadiana.
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4 comments:
Sad news of her passing. I only saw her perform once -- at a women's music festival in Winnipeg around 1983-84. It was a couple of years before she was "discovered" and became a Canadian star. She absolutely blew away the crowd with her voice and her songs!
This has been a bad cycle for losing the old good ones. Jonathan Winters, Malachi Throne, Annette, and others.
That is one of my most favourite TPB episodes -- Rita MacNeil harvesting weed and saying "Here's a nice one, dear." CBC replayed her interview with George Strombo tonight. What a sweetie she was.
That generation that includes Stompin' Tom were all class. Just gentle and sweet and kind. That is the Canada I like to remember.
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