Stompin’ Tom’s music returns to Ottawa
By Duncan Fremlin
“To this day, I can close my eyes and immediately feel transported to a fairy-tale kind of moment, like a three- dimensional memory. I’m not imagining it. I am lounging in what appears to be a committee room in Canada’s House of Commons, walls covered with polished wood panels and garish chandeliers hanging from the 30-foot ceilings, the kind one might see in Buckingham Palace. It’s called the Confederation Room. Decisions of national importance are made here.
I’m sitting on a large chair that is equally as magnificent in its size and weight. My elbows are leaning on an enormous marble table. Next to me, at the head of the table, sits Stompin’ Tom Connors.”
We are about to perform the biggest show of our lives.
Over the years, I’ve seen Tom overcome with emotion. That says a lot about the man. I never saw him nervous, until July 1, 1993.
Tom Connors was a veteran Canadian superstar, a household name. Yet, in the hours before his first and only appearance at this historic Canada Day concert, in front of millions of his fellow patriots watching live or on television, he was fidgeting. His band Whiskey Jack sat with him. He tried to relax as he leaned back with his size 14 cowboy boots propped up on the large marble boardroom table next to a hubcap-sized ashtray and a Canadian Tire picnic cooler full of beer on the floor by his side.
“His normal ease and playfulness were replaced with an out-of-character seriousness, an intensity that we would see only in the hours leading up to a big show. If there was any doubt this was not going to be a normal gig, that was over.”
His nervousness followed him on stage. He messed up the lyrics to his first song, Canada Day – Up Canada Way. Moments later he teared up, emotionally overcome by this special moment.
“It was an absolutely fantastic scene, hundreds of thousands of flags waving, a sea of red and white. We hadn’t even started to play, yet a half-million Canadians were yelling for Tom. Then, suddenly, in French and English, the announcer says: “Next up. Someone we all know and love. His songs are snapshots of our lives. With his tribute to Canada Day, please welcome a proud Canadian, Stompin’ Tom Connors.
Tom began, “It’s Canada Day, up Canada Way. . .
The force of his performance was evident when he stepped to the mic, even before he sang a note. He got off on the wrong foot immediately [and started to] mix and match the lines, in no particular order . . . This was the perfect song to sing on this day. He wrote it for exactly this moment, and he made the most of it.
Meanwhile, standing behind Tom on the back line was a smiling Whiskey Jack band. We were glancing at each other with a “Can you believe this?” look on our faces. Graham Townsend, looking stately in his white suit, was to my right sawing away on his fiddle, all business . . . Everyone was playing brilliantly. The show was going just as we all dreamed.
When the song ended, there was pandemonium. Flags and banners continued to move about, the cheers were deafening. I sometimes wonder if Tom had ever thought that a simple fellow from Skinner’s Pond, P.E.I., could have owned a stage of this magnitude. And on it he did. This was his moment. He had the ear of the nation, of his beloved Canada. He couldn’t have scripted this scene better if he had tried.”
When we played Ottawa with Tom in the years after that, something special always happened. There was the practical joke he played on me at Webb’s Motel, one that backfired. Then there was the time he came close to firing me from the tour.
On October 20, 31 years later, we returned with Tom’s songs and a boatload of stories, like when he almost punched me in the mouth. The show “Whiskey Jack Presents Stories & Songs of Stompin’ Tom” will play on October 20 at Redbird Live, 1165 Bank Street, at 7 p.m.
Duncan Fremlin, the leader/producer/author, is co-founder, banjo player and chief storyteller with Whiskey Jack, a veteran band on the Canadian music scene for 45 years now.. In the 1980s, they were cast members of the CBC’s Tommy Hunter Show and in the 1990s, they began a 25-year relationship with Stompin’ Tom Connors. Their show, “Whiskey Jack Presents Stories & Songs of Stompin’ Tom” is now in its 10th year.
