Remembering Stan
Stan Rogers died twenty two years ago this week. He returning from a folk festival in the States when a cabin fire broke out in his plane. He was thirty three years old.
I guess there’s a whole group of younger music fans who may never have heard of Stan. He was a big guy, 6/6″ or so, bald and bearded. He had a deep, powerful, mellow voice, like the bass pedal of an organ rumbling in a rum-soaked oaken cask, and an astonishing gift for writing songs that sounded as though they were a hundred years old, even when he sang about oil refineries in Calgary or being an unemployed Newfie contemplating a move to Toronto.
I first met Stan in 1979 in Hartford, Connecticut. It was at the Folk Legacy Festival, a pretty hard-core, knowledgeable trad music audience. We had just finished recording our first record, and were about to play our first real gig as a band, and we were nervous as hell. Stan finished his set and came backstage ranting about the “Folk Nazis” who wouldn’t listen to “any song younger than their goddamned grandparents”. I think he noticed we were a bit anxious; he stuck around, joking and encouraging us, and stood in the wings while we played our set, grinning. After the concert he made a point of coming up to each of us and chatting about our music, a very generous and gracious gesture.
Over the next couple of years I saw him perform a dozen times or so, at festivals, concerts and a couple of smaller bar gigs. To say he had “presence” doesn’t do him justice. At every performance, from the moment he walked on stage he captured the audience utterly and completely. Being a giant probably helped. He was very funny and a great storyteller, and sometimes his introductions would last longer than the songs…they were spellbinding.
But what he left behind were the songs. He wrote about every corner of Canada, from Calgary to Inuvik, with some classic east coasters that have entered the traditional repertoire (I once spoke to a young folk fan who refused to believe that Stan had written “Barrett’s Privateers”. “It sounds too OLD”, she said.) He had no particular political axe to grind: he just created characters who were absolutely real, absolutely Canadian, and at the same time universal.
There are a few of his songs that are good candidates for a new national anthem, when everyone finally admits what a bad song “Oh Canada” is. “Northwest Passage” would do, and so would “Barrett’s Privateers”. But my nomination would be “The Mary Ellen Carter“, the best shipwreck song ever. It’s about courage, and faith, and stubbornness, and loyalty.
And you to whom adversity has dealt the final blow
With smiling bastards lying to you everywhere you go
Turn to, put out all your strength of arm and heart and brain
And like the Mary Ellen Carter, rise again.
Rise again, rise again
Though your heart it be broken and life about to end
No matter what you’ve lost, be it a home, a love, a friend
Like the Mary Ellen Carter, rise again!
If you’ve got an old Stan Rogers recording lying around, dig it out this week and remind yourself of the giant we lost on that runway twenty two years ago. And if you’ve never heard him…download “The Mary Ellen Carter”, and meet Stan.
I hadn’t heard of Stan Rogers, but Barrett’s Privateers and the Mary Ellen Carter are among my favourite drinking songs. Thank you for the lesson. I tip my glass to the late, great Mr. Rogers.
What a once-in-a-generation voice. CBC Radio will occasionally run some Stan retrospects, otherwise he’s slipped into nostalgic semi-obscurity. He deserves better. What tremendous beer-drinking music!
Stageleft, what’s with this ” our first record ” stuff? That places your band at least one notch above the chicken-wire cage circuit. If I may be so bold, what was the name of your ensemble?
The post containing “first record” came from balbulican, I’ll leave him to shed more light on that if he so desires….. I played guitar in “Assorted Phobias” though, we never came close to a record
Oops, my error.
Balbulican?
Why, Mike, you tricksy devil. Luring me out of the Batcave again, are we?
I played in a bunch of folk and trad bands for years. When I was in College I was actually playing Irish bar band stuff on weekends, and roadying for a proto-metal band during the week…a period of musical schizophrenia that left indelible scars.
The best group I ever had came together to accompany Ian Robb, a wonderful British/Canadian traditional singer. We enjoyed the recording so much we took the material on the road, mostly summer festivals in Canada (although we did do the Philadelphia Folk Festival). We recorded one more album of fiddle tunes, and then life got in the way. Our lead singer met this Japanese artist who was kinda weird, and…no, wait, that was my OTHER band…
.
And now, the teaser:
I recall one day being shown a picture on the web…. I just refound said picture once again – when was that taken anyway? Your hair was almost as long as mine was in the mid-70s
Balbs, a fellow folky, well I’ll be damned. Alright, I’m not a real folky, but my step-dad is, complete with large collection of odd instruments like Mando-Basses and Buzuki’s, all of which I dabbled in while I was a red-eyed teenager inspecting his workshop. I’ve also had the unexplicable urge to add a banjo to my own instrument collection, their just so twangy….
So are you gonna let us hear any of your recordings? I’ll trade you a few tracks if you like, I recorded a disc about two years ago with a singer/song writer, and a hand-drumer, faster punky-accoustic kind of stuff, definitely a “unique” sound anyway.
Here’s the first album, Hang the Piper, recorded back when they really were “albums”!
Grit Laskin, the mandolin/bouzouki player, is one of Canada’s best know luthiers (he made Stan Rogers’ instruments), and has about a dozen of his own recordings now. Ian now records solo, with the Friends of Fiddlers Green, and as one third of “Finest Kind”. Jon, the Uillean piper, is now a pipe maker in Halifax; and Seamus McGuire, the fiddler, is a pediatric surgeon back in Ireland, and records with “Moving Cloud.”
Balbulican:
You really are an International Man of Mystery. You’ve probably got a closet full of frilly ruffled puffy shirts to boot.
By the way, your album link didn’t take. Intentional, no????
I’ll unmask you yet, even if I have to buy that damn book!
Mike, so sorry…I’m very sloppy with links. Try now, I think it will work.