Toronto Sun reviewer Jim Slotek writes ""a "standing-O’ at the end of last (Saturday) night’s barn-burning Rankin Family Reunion show (at Massey Hall) was to be expected. But a standing-hello?""

John Morris’s daughter Molly also continues to get high praise for her alt.country songs and her fiddle playing.

""She picked up a fiddle and made a case for heredity, dueting with band-fiddler Howie MacDonald on two numbers, including a scorching Cape Breton hoedown,"" Stolek writes. ""In a giddily emotional moment, she also step-danced with aunts Heather and Raylene in the encore Mairi’s Wedding.""

The Massey Hall crowd was ignited.

""To be at a concert this energized and emotional is to be reminded what live performance should be about. Losing the Rankins was a loss to our musical identity. Rediscovering them is a revelation,"" Stolek says.

The Rankins Reunion pulls into Sydney’s Centre 200 on Friday and Halifax Metro Centre on Saturday.

Molly Rankin, daughter of the late John Morris Rankin, is joining her uncle Jimmy and aunts Heather, Cookie and Raylene on a cross-country Rankin Family reunion tour which winds it way to Sydney Friday at Centre 200 at 8 p.m.

Molly, 19, said the tour is going well and she’s cherishing every moment of life on the road.

“It’s a very interesting experience. It’s exciting,” she said. “It’s nice to get up and go to work but it’s a different kind of work. It’s a good kind of work. Performing is probably the best part and then you get to hang out with everyone on the bus and spend time with people.”

Being back together as a group inevitably brings back memories of John Morris — the fifth member of the original group who died in a motor-vehicle accident in 2000 — for his siblings who spent more than a decade recording and touring before disbanding in 1999.

“Being on the road again brings up a lot of stories for them and that’s something that I get to experience,” said Molly. “It’s a lot of the same people on this tour so I’m kind of immersed in what he was immersed in, I guess. I get to hear lots of great stories.”

Molly said she thinks her father would be proud to see her on stage, carrying on the musical traditions which were such a big part of her upbringing.

“He had a huge influence on not only my liking for my music but the way I play the fiddle and the way I sing and go about things,” she said. “I think he would want me to be pursuing this kind of thing. My thoughts are that he would want me to be included.”

As the daughter of such a well-known musician, Molly is aware that comparisons will be drawn between the two but welcomes them.

“As far as comparing. I compare myself. I think if he would like what I’m doing constantly. For other people (to compare us) I don’t think it’s a bad thing. I think it’s a good thing.”

And make no mistake, Molly definitely has her own musical style and tastes — Oasis is her favorite band and she’s a fan of Kathleen Edwards, and Halifax-based bands Mardeen, Two Hours Traffic, Joel Plaskett.

“I do play the fiddle but I’m very much into writing music and songs, and guitar and things like that,” she said.

One song Molly penned is included on the recently-released Rankin Family Reunion CD.

“The song is called Sunset. It was written a few years ago. I don’t really know what it’s about. I like the chords and the words just kind of came to me,” she explained.

While on tour, Molly performs Sunset each night, plays several fiddle numbers, and does some stepdancing and back-up vocals. She said she’s looking forward to getting back to the Maritimes and seeing some familiar faces in the audience.

A student at Dalhousie University, Molly said she’s not sure what the future holds but isn’t ruling out following in her family’s footsteps.

“I think this tour was going to be a good test of what I was able to do, as far as sticking it out and having what it takes to perform every night,” she said. “I think it’s going pretty well and I would love to pursue a career in music.”

Photo: Molly Rankin (Photo by Nick Pearce ­ Dalhousie University)

Ten years since calling it quits, the world-famous family of singers from Cape Breton announced last November that they would reunite to tour with a new album titled "The Rankin Family Reunion."

But when older sister Geraldine died suddenly of a brain aneurysm on Jan. 10, there was real concern that the grief-stricken family's remaining members would scrap their plans to perform.

Thankfully the four siblings, Cookie, Raylene, Heather and brother Jimmy decided to carry on as a way of coping, if not altogether burying their collective grief, a grief made worse by the cruel coincidence of the recent anniversary of the death of eldest brother and founding member John Morris, in a car accident in Jan. 2000.

So it was a rare opportunity to see The Rankins, best-known for toe-tapping, almost festive tunes and traditional ballads, share their private and deeply-felt sadness with 4,000 fans as they poured their souls into a poignant two-hour set of three- and four-part harmonizing.

There was little trace of their feelings as they began with rollicking, maritime-flavoured tunes such as "Fare Thee Well Love", "Gillis Mountain" and a singalong on "Fisherman's Son."

It seemed that the foursome was going to brave it out for the night, when middle sister Raylene stepped up to the microphone alone.

"We're mourning the loss of both of them and no words can describe our sorrow," she whispered as their pianist played a stirring solo tribute to the sister who played piano for the band in the 1970s.

You could have heard a pin drop.

But that remarkable moment didn't darken the mood. Far from it, the tightly-knit siblings turned high emotion into a rousing celebration of life and music, performing a cover of David Francey's ode to drink "Sunday Morning" and John Hiatt's "Gone," undoubtedly the happiest sad song this reviewer has ever heard.

Meanwhile Jimmy, who spent much of the first half playing guitar and letting his sisters do all the singing, used his turn at the microphone to plug his new solo album called "Edge of Day" by performing the first single, the gentle rocker "Slipping Away."

The evening's highlight was a soaring rendition of "We Rise Again" with Raylene's stratospherically-high vocals sending the audience into rapture.

But the freshest surprise was the addition of John Morris' daughter Molly.

It turns out that this second-generation Rankin is a triple threat, singing and accompanying herself on guitar on "Sunset," which she wrote for the new disc. Later, she swapped her guitar for a fiddle for a rollicking duet with Howie MacDonald.

The Rankins closed the concert with the traditional reel "Mary's Wedding," "Same Way Too" and the family favourite "The Departing Song".

It was a fitting way to end to an extraordinary concert.

REVIEW: The Rankin Family
"Poignant two-hour set"
Sun rating: 4 out of 5

Photo: The remaining members of The Rankin Family play Ottawa's Civic Centre Wednesday night. (Sean Kilpatrick SUN)

"I haven't got a jumper (sweater), so I am going to have to grab a couple jumpers from the airport," said Lakeman, who is opening for The Rankin Family on the eastern portion of its cross-Canada tour - including a show at the Halifax Metro Centre on Saturday.

"I have a big coat and some gloves, hats and scarfs that my mother gave me yesterday. I think I am going to need it from what I've seen online in terms of temperature."

While he might be feeling a little cold on this trip, Lakeman is hot at the moment. A finalist for the 2005 Mercury Music Prize, the singer and fiddler won singer-of-the-year honours at the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards last weekend.

The recent accolade was for Lakeman's third solo album, Freedom Fields, a collection of songs pulled from the stories and myths of his hometown of Dartmoor, located in Devon in southwest England.

"It's put us in a great position; it's exciting," said the 29-year-old, who has been credited with helping to make folk music sexy again. "It's a very energy-driven, acoustic, wooden style of music that we are portraying.

"Singing songs about shipwrecks and maidens and conflicts, and playing them to a load of students who seem to be enjoying it. It seems to be quite bizarre, I don't think it would have happened 10 years ago when I was a student."

Lakeman should know. He began playing music at an early age with his parents, who were part of a touring band, and later jonied with his older siblings, Sam and Sean, as The Lakeman Brothers.

They brothers later became part of Equation. The folk band was short-lived, and in 2002. Lakeman released his first solo CD, The Bunch Bowl, and his 2005 follow-up, Kitty Jay.

Released last March, Freedom Fields pulls on the stories Lakeman has known since he was a cubscout.

While the stories are connected to his little corner of England, they are also tied to his own experiences living there, making the songs universally popular.

"I guess that shows the power of songs," he said. "I always try to relate to them as personally as possible, because the stories are really dramatic.

"Dartmoor, people say, has more legends and stories than anywhere else in Europe. If you keep digging, there can be many records about this area to come."

IF YOU GO
WHAT: Seth Lakeman, opening for The Rankin Family
WHERE: The Halifax Metro Centre
WHEN: Saturday at 8 p.m.
TICKETS: $51, call 451-1221

Lakeman's fine folk

British folk rocker to open the Rankins reunion show tonight in Halifax

February 10, 2007 - Halifax Herald

By Stephen Cooke, Entertainment Reporter

OVER THE PAST decade, a vibrant modern folk scene has developed across the pond with performers like Kate Rusby, Cara Dillon and Karine Polwart making brilliant records and building fanbases around the world at festivals and concert halls.

Raised on a diet of British folk-rock renaissance icons like Fairport Convention and Nick Drake, with iconoclasts like Bob Dylan and Billy Bragg for good measure, the current generation of singer-songwriters blends tradition and modern musicality while creating a movement that’s not only vibrant, but enduring.

Out of all these recent artists, the one likeliest to become that most dreaded of creatures, a household name, is Devon musician Seth Lakeman. Already a safe bet to sell out venues in the U.K. after the success of the Mercury Prize nominated Kitty Jay CD, and his latest Freedom Fields, Lakeman appears tonight at the Halifax Metro Centre at 8 p.m. as part of the Rankin Family’s reunion tour.

"I understand the Rankins are like the royal family of folk where you come from," says Lakeman from his home in South West England. "It’s amazing that they can acheive that kind of success in Canada."

Lakeman is getting a taste of chart success in England, with Freedom Fields and a pair of singles, Lady of the Sea and The White Hare making dents on the pop list. And while he may have rugged good looks and an earnest crooning vocal style, Lakeman still makes music on his own terms, with has band’s chiming blend of acoustic instruments — including his unique four-string tenor guitar alongside fiddle, banjo and bouzouki — and storytelling songs that demand attentive listening.

And while Lakeman has a penchant for songs of the sea, or lovers going into battle, it’s up to the listener to decide if his characters are off to fight the Spanish Armada or Al Qaeda.

"Wars are terrible things, they always have been and they always will be," he says. "While you dream of a world without them, at the same time they give birth to these incredibly human stories that don’t change over time."

Other songs by Lakeman — who also grew up in a musical family and released his first record Three Piece Suite with his brothers in 1994 — are more traditional in the tales they tell.

The White Hare comes from an old west country legend of a witch who takes the form of a hare and goes out on the moor looking for souls to steal. Even though it sounds like something out of Wuthering Heights, Lakeman says he’ll frequently go out on nearby Dartmoor to soak up the landscape and kickstart his creative gears.

"That’s pretty much the style of life around here," he says. "You go from the craziness of London and the corporate world that exists around music, and unfortunately you have to deal with that to reach an audience, and then you do come back here and wander the moor and try to get inspiration.

""I’d much rather go down the pub with an old boy and learn about the stories of old. Combining the two worlds does get confusing sometimes.""

Tickets for the Rankin Family with Seth Lakeman at the Halifax Metro Centre are $51 each (plus $4 for online orders) at the Ticket Atlantic box office (451-1221), participating Atlantic Superstore outlets or at www.ticketatlantic.com

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Rankins have a rousing good time

Metro Centre family reunion harmonious and heartfelt

February 11, 2007 - Halifax Herald

By Stephen Cooke, Entertainment Reporter

It's a little hard to believe it's been nearly two decades since the music of Mabou's Rankin Family first began travelling in earnest across the Canso Causeway, and my own career practically begins around the same time theirs did, around the time of the self-titled debut album and a stage show called The Mabou Jig.

While it's hard to say if the Rankins' current Reunion CD and tour will carry any further ramifications for the group, or be put to rest when it wraps up in Newfoundland next week, Saturday night's Halifax Metro Centre show proved that the musical legacy they began in 1989 remains a powerful and beloved one.

Jimmy Rankin and sisters Cookie, Raylene and Heather were in good spirits on Saturday, due in no small part to the vigorous response of the audience. The crowd greeted the group with an instant standing ovation for the opening bars of Jimmy's Roving Gypsy Boy, while Heather's lead on North Country set the mood for an evening of Cape Breton melodies and memories.

"We're so proud to be back here," said Cookie. "In our early days it was so different when we started traveling in England and Scotland, and the only accent we could understand was our own.

"We'd have to decipher requests like, 'Cuckah, sayng burdahs en tam!' So that's what we're going to do; sing Borders and Time."

The heartache of Cookie's solo gave way to the gentle nostalgia of Raylene's Gillis Mountain, given a sparkling treatment with Clarence Deveau on banjo, Bruce Jacobs' stand-up bass and fiddler Howie MacDonald switching to mandolin. There were plenty of opportunities for MacDonald to shine on his signature instrument, like a solo in a rollicking treatment of David Francey's Sunday Morning and a pair of lively duets with Molly, daughter of the Rankins' late brother John Morris. One set had them shift gears from a strathspey to a jig and then finally a reel with the full band blazing away, driven by drummer Brian Talbot (Slainte Mhath).

The memory of both John Morris and older sister Geraldine, who died suddenly at the outset of the tour, was honoured with a performance of Bishop MacDonald by pianist Mac Morin. It was a touching tribute, leading into Raylene's beautiful Lambs in Spring, sung with Heather and Cookie, full of reminiscences of youth.

Pointing towards the future were Jimmy's Slipping Away, from the forthcoming solo CD Edge of Day, about a man in self-imposed exile, looking for that inspiration at the end of the road, and Molly's Sunset, a highlight of the Reunion CD. The younger Rankin's voice has an aching, willowy quality inspired by modern singer-songwriters like Sarah Harmer and Kathleen Edwards, while her lyrics about a love affair's dying days seem to carry wisdom beyond her 19 years.

Rankins' favourites like Orangedale Whistle and Cookie's impassioned Fare Thee Well Love were each met with jubilant audience approval, while the Irish folk tune Tell My Ma had fans on their feet instantly and dancing in the aisles.

As singers, the sisters showed no sign of being absent from full-time performing for the past eight years, with each handling their solo vocals with aplomb and those familiar sweet harmonies maintaining all their reed-like qualities. Heather generated roars with a spirited Fisherman's Son, while Raylene's rendition of Leon Dubinsky's Rise Again remains an ovation-earning showstopper that can't help but generate chills.

But the show closer remains Jimmy's epic Mull River Shuffle, a dramatic recreation of a Saturday night party 50 years ago, with the singer-songwriter seemingly channelling The Doors Jim Morrison doing Weird Scenes Inside the Mabou Coal Mines.

"Let's tear the roof off this place," Jimmy implored, and the crowd complied, leading to a foot-stomping finale with some virtuoso fiddle work from MacDonald and an infectious feeling of joy filling the arena.

The Rankins' concert also provided a welcome opportunity for modern British folk artist Seth Lakeman to make his premiere Halifax appearance. Backed by brother Sean on guitar and double bassist Ben Nichols, the Devonshire singer proved multi-talented on tenor guitar and solo fiddle, as well as an expert spinner of tales of the sea and doomed lovers.

His brief set makes one hope for a future appearance on these shores, perhaps at the Stan Rogers Folk Festival or Celtic Colours.

Photos: Rankin Family siblings Jimmy, Cookie, Raylene and Heather perform for 6,000 jubilant fans at the Halifax Metro Centre on Saturday night. (Ingrid Bulmer / Staff)

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O'Reilley left legacy in his songbook, friends say

"His songs are timeless, and just beautiful," colleague laments

February 19, 2007 - CBC News

Saddened friends and colleagues of Dermot O'Reilly said the Irish-born folk performer left a rich legacy of songs, but will be remembered for far more than the music he created.

O'Reilly, 64, a founding member of legendary folk trio Ryan's Fancy, died Saturday of an apparent heart attack.

"It's a terrible loss, for me personally as a friend, but for the traditional music community in Newfoundland," said Great Big Sea member Bob Hallett.

"His own enthusiasm was so infectious, he kind of led us and pushed us along … He was like a Santa Claus character walking through life."

It's a little hard to believe it's been nearly two decades since the music of

Great Big Sea recorded their debut album on a budget of less than $1,000 in O'Reilly's home studio. It went on to sell 50,000 copies, and launched their careers as international mainstays of the Celtic music boom.

O'Reilly was a fixture on the St. John's music circuit for decades, right up to his death.

O'Reilly performed for the last time on Friday night, in a St. John's pub. Earlier that week, he and long-time performing partner Fergus O'Byrne opened for The Rankins at Mile One Centre in St. John's.

Brookes Diamond, the Halifax-based promoter who sponsored the Rankins show, said he was stunned to learn of his long-time friend's death over the weekend.

"I don't think he has sung better — ever — than he has sung in the last while," Diamond said.

"He had great love in him … He was wonderfully honest, and he was so much fun, so introspective and so caring. But he was sharp, too — he wasn't afraid to tell you what he really thought of things."

O'Reilly, who emigrated from Ireland to Canada in the 1960s, moved to Newfoundland in 1971. He formed Ryan's Fancy with O'Byrne and fellow Irish expatriate Denis Ryan, and the trio earned fame through recordings, tours and a CBC Television series.

"Certainly, there was such a considerable contribution to the music industry, and to the province. There's a tremendous legacy there," said Denis Parker, executive director of Music Newfoundland and Labrador.

Guitarist Sandy Morris, who worked with O'Reilly over more than three decades, said young music fans in particular loved O'Reilly's performances.

"He had a great sensitivity and warmth and love about him. I think it reflects in his songs," Morris said.

"His songs are timeless, and just beautiful."

Hallett said O'Reilly may well be remembered for the songs he composed, particularly West Country Lady — a nostalgic song based in his adopted home of Torbay, just north of St. John's — and the popular Christmas singalong tune Children's Winter.

"He wrote some amazing songs," he said.

"Children's Winter has become a standard Christmas song in the repertoires of singers around the world … West Country Lady has become one of the great Newfoundland folk songs," Hallett said.

"As somebody who does that for a living, I know how hard it is to write a song that stands up to the great folk music. That's what Dermot managed to do, and it's no easy task." 

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A musical travelogue

Rita MacNeil's Cape Breton depicts visual diversity of her island home

April 5, 2007 - Halifax Herald

By Tim Arsenault

TIMING IS EVERYTHING in show business but the waiting game can still be a bother.

Take the latest television special from singer-songwriter Rita MacNeil. Shot during the summer of 2005, it finally debuts this weekend.

Rita MacNeil's Cape Breton, a one-hour musical travelogue, airs Sunday at 7 p.m. on CTV.

"I'm just happy that I'm back doing what I love to do and so pleased to see the special see the light of day," said MacNeil, 62, during a phone interview.

The Big Pond native is proud to show off the visual diversity of her home territory through the show, which is understandable since it's played an integral part in inspiring such MacNeil standards as She's Called Nova Scotia and Home I'll Be.

"It's such a big part of who I am and what I sing about and what I talk about. I think the combination worked well," she said.

Rita MacNeil's Cape Breton was shot entirely on location and includes performances staged in Mabou, Iona, Ingonish, Neils Harbour, the Savoy Theatre in Glace Bay, Arichat, the Middlehead Peninsula conservation area and MacNeil's own tea room in Big Pond.

"It was great to do. We had wonderful locations. Certainly Mabou and Arichat and the mountain scene - gosh, it was very exciting. And I was so proud to be taping at the beautiful Savoy in Glace Bay," she said.

MacNeil is joined in her celebration of the island by guests Jimmy Rankin, Ashley MacIsaac, Aselin Debison, the Men of the Deeps vocal group, gospel singer Mavis Staples, Canadian Idol finalist Gary Beals and native ensemble Sons of Membertou.

"The guests who came with the whole program made it special for me . . . They added such a great element to it," enthused MacNeil, who said one of her favourite segments was an evening performance staged outside the Red Shoe Pub in Mabou - hometown of the Rankin Family.

Jimmy does energetic renditions of his solo hit Followed Her Around and the Rankins staple Roving Gypsy Boy and is joined by MacNeil for an up-tempo run through You Feel the Same Way Too.

"That was absolutely amazing. Jimmy Rankin is electrifying live. It was just such a pleasure to be a small part of that whole thing and be in their territory in Mabou," said MacNeil.

"It was awesome. I was so very honoured."

MacNeil, whose pop-folk profile took off in 1987 with the release of the Flying on Your Own album, said she occasionally watches Canadian Idol and was struck by Cherry Brook's Beals during the show's initial season.

"Gary caught my attention. I loved his voice and just loved his performance on this special. I think it worked amazingly well and it was good to see that come together for such a young performer," she said, though she remains unsure about how much Idol jump-starts careers.

"It takes amazing courage to do what they're doing and to be critiqued like they are. That has to be very hard. I hope it helps. I'm not sure. There's been controversy about whether it does or it doesn't."

MacNeil has also weathered the ups and downs of the music industry, which has changed to an almost unrecognizable degree since she started, and continues to do so at an alarming rate.

"Well, it's like nothing I ever thought would happen. It's all changed so much. It's another time, isn't it? That's where it's at," she said.

"I'm just happy that I've been in this business so long and still have the base I do have to tour and do these kinds of shows. I feel very fortunate in these changing times that I have endured."

MacNeil said she's also grateful to have her health back. Her Christmas tour in December reluctantly had to be cancelled as doctors ordered her to rest to help recover from an infection.

"But I'm back on track. I've completed a tour. I was out for a month and got home the end of March," she said.

"(I'm feeling) a lot better and the trick is to keep it that way."

Coincidentally, work on Rita MacNeil's Cape Breton took place when the singer-songwriter wasn't feeling well. She credits production of the special with allowing her to feel better.

"It was a pleasure to do and we did it at a time when I was very ill. To have it come off as well as it did, I was very excited to see that happen," she said.

"It was all booked to do and you know how long it takes to get these things together. It was amazing how everyone made me feel and certainly made me realize how important the music is to me in my heart."

MacNeil will resume touring later this month across Canada in support of her latest CD, Songs My Mother Loved. An Intimate Evening with Rita MacNeil has stops scheduled for May 9 at the deCoste Entertainment Centre in Pictou, May 10 at Th'Yarc Playhouse & Arts Centre in Yarmouth and May 11 at the Astor Theatre in Liverpool.

Photo: Rita MacNeil's Cape Breton will take viewers across the island including a stop at the Red Shoe in Mabou, where Jimmy Rankin and his band performed.(CTV)

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Rita returns to the small screen

Rita MacNeil's Cape Breton airs Sunday on CTV

April 5, 2007 - Cape Breton Post

By Laura Jean Grant

SYDNEY — With breathtaking Cape Breton scenery as a backdrop, Rita MacNeil and some of her favourite performers will be featured in a one-hour musical television special this weekend.

Rita MacNeil’s Cape Breton airs Sunday at 8 p.m. on CTV.

Filmed about two years ago at various island locations, MacNeil said she’s thrilled the finished product is being brought to a national audience.

“Hopefully it’ll do well and it’s exciting to have it out there and to have such a nice combination of the island and the folks that are represented here,” she said.

MacNeil is joined by a number of renowned musicians and singers for the special including Jimmy Rankin, Ashley MacIsaac, Aselin Debison, Sons of Membertou, The Men of the Deeps, Gary Beals and Mavis Staples.

A veteran of television variety shows and specials, MacNeil said she loves sharing the stage with other performers.

“I think music is a shared experience and I think it’s wonderful when we get together and we can do this together and support each other. I think that’s what music is all about,” she said.

MacNeil, who was ill and in and out of hospital during much of the filming of the special, said having the support of her fellow musicians and hearing their music also served as a source of inspiration at that time.

“It was quite amazing,” she said.

The special was shot entirely on Cape Breton Island in numerous communities from Arichat and Iona, to Neil’s Harbour and the Middlehead Peninsula, to well-known venues like the Red Shoe Pub in Mabou, the Savoy Theatre in Glace Bay and MacNeil’s own Rita’s Tea Room in Big Pond.

“It’s showing the talent but it’s also showing the island, so it’s a good combination because these are the sorts of things that I love, and I always talk about Cape Breton when I’m on tour,” she said. “It’s nice to see a one-hour special featuring a lot of these spots that I do talk about.”

MacNeil said she’s done a lot of work with CTV over the years and is pleased they agreed to come to Cape Breton for this latest project.

“I’ve done a lot of specials and this is another one we wanted to do. So, of course the location for me is always preferably home,” she said.

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Musical offspring

With the recent arrival of second child, Jimmy Rankin is now ready for another delivery, his third solo studio recording on Tuesday

May 5, 2007 - Halifax Herald

By Stephen Cooke, Entertainment Reporter

CREATIVELY, the past year has been a watershed for singer-songwriter Jimmy Rankin.

A year ago, the Mabou native started work on his new album, Edge of Day, in Nashville, which hits stores on Tuesday. But a few months later he found himself in the middle of an acclaimed Rankin Family reunion album and national tour with sisters Raylene, Cookie and Heather, plus niece Molly. And two weeks ago came the most important production of all, a new daughter with his wife Mia, with the musical name of Chloe.

"The two projects kind of overlapped," says Rankin of his studio work, taking a rare break at his Halifax home. "I was finishing this CD while trying to get material together for the Rankins record, and then I mastered mine in January. But the Rankin thing came together very quickly, from start to finish. It wasn’t even really supposed to be a record, but we kept gathering material for it. So essentially I made two records over the course of a few months.

"I’ve been doing nothing but making records and making babies . . . it’s time consuming! Where do you get the time to do all this stuff?"

The arrival of Chloe doubles the kid population in the Rankin household, where son James is now 20 months old, but as the member of a rather well-known and prolific family himself, the musician has more than an inkling of what he’s in for.

"It’s amazing, I highly recommend having kids," he affirms. "They don’t realize it, but they need a playmate, and they’re a good space of ages apart. I come from a family of 12; I can’t imagine being an only child.

"But now four seems like a big family, and here I am, I can’t imagine handling more than two."

As for his musical offspring, Edge of Day features 13 bouncing baby melodies, with Rankin’s mix of contemporary pop and folk getting an extra polish from Canadian producer/musician Colin Linden.

"It was really fun working with him, I’ve wanted to for a long time," says Rankin. "He’s one of those people you keep running into at events, and you start talking about music. He’s also a writer, which is nice for me as a songwriter. It’s a bonus, if you’re second-guessing something about a song, you can ask him what he thinks because he’s got experience in that department.

"He was great to bounce ideas off; if you’re not sure about the shape of a bridge, or the break in a song, or a lyric. And the band he assembled was really cool, which is his thing. He likes an organic approach to recording, he’s very rootsy."

Linden is known for a variety of projects, from working with Colin James to joining in the O Brother Where Art Thou? roots music phenomenon. Plus there’s his own solo work and his membership in Blackie and the Rodeo Kings which keep him in the limelight on the concert and festival circuit.

Preferring a simple approach for Rankin’s songs of love and loss, he assembled a top notch band of players and recorded most of Edge of Day live off the floor, trying to avoid overdubs and digital fixes. While in Nashville, Rankin got sister Cookie to provide sweet harmony on a handful of tracks, while Cape Breton’s Grammy winner and longtime friend and cohort Gordie Sampson plays guitar and sings on When I Rise and their collaboration Got to Leave Louisiana.

"We started writing the song before the hurricane, and it was kind of a gratuitous love song, and I didn’t think it really fit," Rankin recalls. "The melody was too good for the song to wind up a throwaway, so I rewrote the lyrics after meeting a lot of people who’d come up to Nashville after fleeing New Orleans.

"I got to experience the city before all that happened; the French Quarter, the bars and all the craziness, and what a grungy great place it was. But the song started then, and it went through all these incarnations, and then after the disaster it seemed to have a new purpose and found its way. Sometimes you just have to wait for them, y’know?"

Among the assembled players at the suburban Nashville hideaway studio known as the Rendering Plant were former Band and Janis Joplin keyboardist Richard Bell, bassist Dave Jacques from John Prine’s band, guitarist John Randall, whose gigs include Lyle Lovett and Emmylou Harris, and as an unplanned surprise, Willie Nelson’s harmonica player Mickey Raphael.

"He was just hanging out in the studio, just popped by to say ‘Hey, how you doing?’ so of course we asked him if he wanted to play on a song. He went out and got his harmonica and the next thing I know he’s playing on my song.

"He’s in his late 50s, but he looks like he’s 40, and he’s been with Willie for 35 years! And he’s a Jewish guy from Brooklyn playing harmonica in this Texas band. Great gig, how many harmonica players get a steady gig for over three decades?

"Nashville’s a great town like that, everybody’s there. Anne Murray’s drummer Gary Craig played on the record, I hadn’t seen him in years, and he’s a great drummer; you wouldn’t know how versatile he is from seeing him play with Anne."

Another special guest was bassist Garry Tallent, best known for providing the bottom groove for Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band, but also a busy producer and guest on records by the likes of Steve Earle, Steve Forbert and Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes.

"He was with Springsteen since the beginning, but now he lives in Nashville, and he’s just a nice guy," says Rankin. "Well-rounded in his interests, and really cool to play with. It took a while to get to know him, but he’s just this cool guy who comes to work, and is easy to shoot the breeze with, talk about wine and travel.

"Music too, of course, I get the impression he’s quite the record collector. It’s funny though, he’s in one of the biggest bands of all time, but he’d never get bothered walking down the street."

With the arrival of Edge of Day, the next step will be for Rankin to get back out on the road to perform the new songs for his fans, but with a new arrival on the homefront, he’s not scheduling shows for a few months yet. There’s still the afterglow of a rewarding coast-to-coast Rankin Family concert tour, the first since the band left the road in 1998 and also the first time he and his siblings have appeared under that billing following the death of brother John Morris in 2001.

"It was a blast to just get out there and play," he says. "Audiences were great from west to east, and you never know if people are going to turn out. It’s not like we’ve been out there actively keeping that thing alive, but it must have had some major impact on people because they came out in large numbers across the country.

"The best thing was that the audience was multi-generational. There were middle-aged people, kids who had probably grown up listening to that music through their parents, and they’re now in their teens and early 20s. And they’re starting to pass the music along to their kids, and that was really interesting. People were calling out for songs like Mull River Shuffle, that’s like some sort of underground anthem for people right across the country."

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Rankin to play Casino July 20, 21

May 12, 2007 - Halifax Herald

Multiple ECMA winner and Juno Award winner, Jimmy Rankin will play Casino Nova Scotia’s Schooner Showroom on Friday, July 20 and Saturday, July 21.

Vocalist and guitar player Rankin is promoting his latest album, Edge of Day, which was released on May 8.

Edge of Day is Rankin’s third solo album. Rankin’s previous solo albums include his debut solo album Song Dog, released in 2001, and Handmade released in 2003.

Rankin is also the principal songwriter for family group The Rankins, having written many of their hit songs such as Fare Thee Well Love, You Feel the Same Way Too, Followed Her Around and Midnight Canvas.

Tickets are $24.98 plus HST and can be purchased at the Casino box office, or call 1-888-6GAMES6. Performances are restricted to those 19 years of age and over.

Tickets also available at the Ticket Atlantic box office, by phone 451-1221, at all participating Atlantic Superstores and online at www.ticketatlantic.com. Major credit cards are accepted, service charges apply.

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The Rankin file update

May 17, 2007 - Cape Breton Post
By Laura Jean Grant

SYDNEY - It's been a whirlwind 2007 so far for Jimmy Rankin and the acclaimed singer-songwriter from Mabou shows no signs of slowing down.

Rankin joined siblings Heather, Raylene and Cookie and niece Molly earlier this year for an exhaustive cross-Canada Rankin Family reunion tour, which included a new album, while also putting the finishing touches on his third solo release, Edge of Day, which hit store shelves last week.

To top it all off, Rankin and wife Mia welcomed their second child, Chloe, less than a month ago, joining 21-month-old James as the Rankin clan continues to grow.

So how's he coping with it all?

"It definitely changes your life, anybody who has children knows that. Kids are 24/7. You really learn to organize your time a lot more than when you didn't have children," he said.

And spare time isn't easy to come by for Rankin, whose career keeps him on the go constantly.

"It's been a busy year. I really enjoyed being out with the Rankins again," he said. "We went from west to east and I have to say it was a lot of fun and it was met with a really great reception right across the country."

Now focusing again on his solo career, Rankin describes his latest album, produced by Colin Linden, as having a bit of a different feel from his previous recordings.

"The whole album is recorded live with a band in a studio and it was a very relaxed environment. It was recorded in a guy's house in Nashville and it's just very relaxed. It's very live sounding, very warm feeling, very organic - to me anyway - and much looser than my other records," he explained.

It's been four years since his last album, Handmade, was released and Rankin noted he doesn't rush the creative process.

In the process of writing material for Edge of Day, Rankin, more than ever before, worked with other artists and writers, including fellow Cape Bretoner Gordie Sampson.

Rankin said time will tell what songs fans embrace the most but he is proud of all aspects of Edge of Day from the opening track, Stranded, to tunes like Got to Leave Louisiana and Slipping Away.

"I never like to put filler on records. I actually like all the songs. There aren't any ones on there that I wouldn't be proud to play for somebody."

Rankin will do some performance dates this summer and a more formal tour in the fall.

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Snippets of life in three and a half minutes

Jimmy Rankin in conversation about his roots as an artist, life on the road and story-telling through song

May 20, 2007 - Halifax Daily News
By Bill ?

It was a charity for one cause or another, I forget which now; Jimmy Rankin sat on a stool with his guitar and sang from his first solo album Song Dog. His sound was fresh and old at the same time. The story was immediately accessible; yet strangely private. The room's attention was fixed on him; from the first word to the dying tones. We were seeing and feeling through his heart and eyes - led by his vision of the story he was telling. I thought: that's what artists do; it's what they've always done.

I wondered if he knew it, or just was it. My first question:

Bill: What is an artist?

Jimmy: It can be a painter or a writer or a poet; my field just happens to be music... it's someone who interprets the world around them and translates it through their medium.

Bill: Why are you one?

A photo by world-renowned visual artist Robert Frank is on Jimmy Rankin's Edge of Day album cover. Jimmy knew Robert when he was a youngster growing up in Mabou. It's a black and white photo of Mabou Mines that could have been taken almost any time, the last millennium. It is beautiful, haunting, mysterious and Mabou, Cape Breton. Jimmy points to it, by way of explanation.

Jimmy: I grew up just up the road from here about seven miles or so ... they had no art or music in the schools, that's the first thing that gets cut back ... so I was very fortunate that there was a little group of us used to go around and visit guys like this (Robert Frank), because we were interested in photography, music, painting and art in general.

They were our teachers.

Bill: There was a bunch of kids who just said, "Let's go get something we aren't getting in school ...?"

Jimmy: Yeah.

I found that odd. Jimmy didn't.

Bill: Where does your art come from?

Jimmy: I don't like to dwell on that too much, but I'm moved by certain things ... like a good story. It strikes a chord in me ... it moves me. A lot of times pop music isn't about that, but the social pop music can be. The stuff I'm inspired by has a heart to it.

I grew up around story telling; around people talking about their history, their past, their sense of community ... there is a lot of that in Cape Breton and when I hear people talking about "Canadian Identity," it kind of makes me laugh. Coming from a place like that or Newfoundland, you know who you are, you know where you're from, you know what you're about. Tim Hortons is not my idea of Canadian identity.

He laughs and leans into the conversation.

Jimmy: I think one of the nice things about this country is that there isn't one single Canadian identity. Maybe even that question of identity is something that comes out of Ontario. I travelled across this country many, many, times. I've been to every province and territory, towns and villages, and everybody has their own unique character ... they have their own story.

There may be things that identify Canadians, I guess ... we're a Northern people, we're Nordic, we have long winters, we're pasty.

Again the quick laugh.

Coming from Cape Breton or Newfoundland, it's the same thing; there is no question about who you are. You're from Nova Scotia, or St. John, or Cornerbrook. That's where you're from. That's who you are. I'm interested in the human condition ... in people. Buddy came over and was helping me build a fence for me and we ended up in the kitchen having a drink of whisky and he started telling me his situation and it just starts something off and away it went. I didn't intend to exploit his story or anything. I just put myself in his position and wrote it in the first person ... I do that a lot. Some people actively go after people. I don't do that.

Bill: So why music?

Jimmy: Music chose me. I went to art school to be a visual artist but I've been around music my whole life. I've never had a music lesson, but here I am. I'm on the road and play music for people and people seem to like it.

To me, it's all one thing.

Bill: What do you want to do with your art?

Jimmy: I want to make a living. It isn't a hobby for me. I want to be creative, but I need to make a living and if you can maintain integrity while you are doing that and get whatever your message is across to people ... then ... you're winning.

I've got a family and little kids and I'm a working musician, and that's hard. I'm working to support a family and be a good father ... and being an entertainer. That's not an easy thing. But you have to strike a balance, if there is one.

Jimmy laughs again.

Bill: What's Jimmy's message?

Jimmy: They're stories. I'm a storyteller. They are snippets of life in three-and-a-half minutes.

I think artists, painters and poets just make life more interesting. What would life be without art? I always take inspiration from people like Matisse and Picasso who were making very relevant art after forty - and I think one of the beefs I have with the music business is the focus on young people. I'm still a relevant person. I may not have the piss and vinegar you had when you were twenty...

I didn't want to tell him I had none then, either.

Jimmy: But as you get older and see a lot more of the world and experience a lot more of life, you tend to become harder about things - more realistic. But I guess it works both ways. You become more realistic about the road, but you still maintain the fantasy. If you know what I mean.

I DIDN'T! He explained.

Jimmy: Years ago, I drove down to New York with Robert Frank and he talked about living the fantasy. And I thought, "What the hell is he talking about?"

Then I realized he's talking about living the dream of being an artist. You dream about stuff ... you wake up in the morning and you write a play, or a song, or a story ... a fantasy.

I think it came from the Beats, living the dream or the fantasy ... to be able to have the guts to do that ... to put your soul or your heart on your shirt sleeve.

Bill: What's next?

Jimmy: I'm promoting my record, writing songs, making a living and living my dream.

Indeed he is, and daring to share every bit of it.

this week's brunch

Jimmy's latest album is Edge of Day. For more biographic information, sample tunes and video go to www.jimmyrankin.com. Do that.
 

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Rankin captures the moment with music

June 22, 2007 - The Cape Breton Post
By Brianna Goldberg

CanWest News Service — Without pristine harmonies or clean-cut Celtic strains, Jimmy Rankin’s new sound is as tousled as his hair.

“It’s basically me and a band playing live off the floor, which is what I love,” Rankin said of his new roots-rock album, Edge of Day.

“A lot of people think the Rankin stuff was so polished, but we actually grew up playing live. That was our schooling in music, so it’s a very natural thing for me to just go for a song.”

The Cape Breton singer-songwriter was known for years as a member of The Rankin Family, that musical monster whose single Fare Thee Well went quadruple platinum in 1992.

Though the family has remained mostly off the radar after the band breakup in 1999, Jimmy Rankin kept his guitar close at hand.

With his third solo record, he’s found a jangly style that’s more raw and rollicking than the rich harmonies of his Rankin Family days.

“I like the kind of sound that captures the moment, and doesn’t rely on all the little bells and whistles,” Rankin explained from his home in Halifax last week, just before leaving on a cross-Canada media tour. “You’re just going for it at the time, and you capture that magic.”

Despite this new tack, Rankin says the love of story that defines the Rankin Family is still at the core of his music.

“Cape Breton is a storytelling culture, whether they’re stories about things that happened last night or 100 years ago. I think my songwriting is really a reflection of that,” he said.

“I was visiting New Orleans a few years ago just for a vacation, hanging around a lot in the French Quarter, walking around, hearing the music. As we were leaving I got this idea for the song, just a verse and a chorus. I couldn’t finish it. I didn’t know what to say or what it was about.”

Rankin said he let the tune sit for years, until he was in Nashville right at the time of Hurricane Katrina and he kept running into people who had fled from the disaster.

“I finished writing the song, and it became about that,” he said.

“I’m glad because I let the song sit, and the song found what it needed to be written about.”

From Cape Breton to Nashville to a World Vision trip to Nicaragua, Jimmy Rankin has covered a lot of ground.

But for all the time and distance, he hasn’t severed from his Rankin Family past.

Jimmy and his sisters made a Rankin Family revival tour last January, playing together for the first time since the loss of their band mate and brother, John Morris, to a car crash in 2000.

“After John Morris died I thought it was very unlikely for us to get together again, because he was really the musical nucleus of the group, the guy at the centre of the music,” said Rankin.

“You never fill John Morris’ shoes.”

But the family was joined by some new musicians — including John Morris’ daughter Molly. Their Rankin carnation was a success.

“I didn’t know what kind of turnout to expect, because we hadn’t been promoting the Rankin thing. Once it was over, it was over,” he said.

“But it was a really multi-generational audience out there — it’s kind of found a new life.”

Rankin says there’s some talk of a family tour in the fall, in addition to his own concert dates in July and August.

And expansion isn’t limited to the stage.

“We have two kids now: a new baby, and a 2-year-old boy,” Rankin said, sounding a little tired.

“My life has become quite the balancing act.”