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2001 ECMA's

December 7, 2000 - ECMA's

The 2001 ECMA nominees were announced today.  Below are the Rankins-related nominations:

Bluegrass Artist/Group of the Year

Atlantic Newgrass Project (this CD features Raylene and a tune by John Morris), Birch Mountain Bluegrass Band, Blacks Mountain, Janet McGarry, Rustic Harmony

Andre Bourgeois, Anne Oakley / Jane Secord, Louis Thomas, Mickey Quase (Rankins manager), Sheri Jones , Birch Mountain Bluegrass Band, Blacks Mountain, Janet McGarry, Rustic Harmony

Andre Bourgeois, Anne Oakley / Jane Secord, Louis Thomas, Mickey Quase (Rankins manager), Sheri Jones

The awards will be handed out in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island on February 11th.  The show will be broadcast on CBC-TV.  For the complete nomination listings, visit www.ecma.ca.

CMT's All-Request Weekend

October 30, 2000 - CMT Canada

It's about seeing the music you love to hear...and all you have to do is ask!

The first CMT All Request Weekend is on the way November 4th and 5th, hosted by The Big Top 20's Greg Shannon and Nancy Sinclair of CMT's Top 10 CDs.

Mark it on your calendar. All weekend long on CMT's first All Request Weekend you can request your favorite videos and we'll play 'em back for you.

We want your requests, your dedications, your help programming this country's favorite country.

There are three ways to get our attention with your video requests on the All Request Weekend:    

Right here at cmtcanada.com on  Nov 4th & 5th
By Fax - send your fax to 403-716-6577
By Phone - call 1-800-CMT-LINE for your chance to make your request to Greg and Nancy on air!       

So go ahead and request your favourite Rankins video (Fare Thee Well Love, Rise Again, North Country, You Feel the Same Way Too, The River, Forty Days and Nights, Roving Gypsy Boy (Remix), Movin' On, Maybe You're Right, Bells).

Vote for the Rankins videos on CMT Canada

September 7, 2000 - CMT Canada

For every Canadian, there is a favourite video!

Make your vote and you might win a copy of the New Country 7 CD!

It's time once again Canada to stand and be counted. Whether your favorite is Shania Twain or Chely Wright, Paul Brandt or Garth Brooks, it's time for you to let us know.

Dont forget to leave us your comments when you make your vote...you might just see them on the Cross Canada Countdown!

We'll tally up the votes and you can watch how your favorite video fared on the Cross Canada Countdown, airing on Thanksgiving Weekend, beginning October 7th. As far as great country videos go, there's guaranteed to not be a turkey in the bunch

Click here to vote.

You'll find a handy list of videos to choose from. Don't forget to type in your e-mail address. Weekly winners will be drawn from our voters. You could win a copy of New Country 7, featuring The Dixie Chicks and Vince Gill.

So go ahead and vote for our favourite Rankins video.  The list is provided when you click on the link above to vote.  Pass the info along to friends and let's get The Rankins #1!

ST. F.X. fetes John Morris - Rankin Sister Sings Tribute to "Late" Brother

August 13, 2000 - Halifax Daily News - by Jo-Anne MacDonald

The music of John Morris Rankin that brings both pain and pleasure to his family filled the still Antigonish air last night.

Celtic artists paid tribute to the late Cape Breton fiddler with the ancient music his family band, The Rankins, helped to bring to the world stage.

Among the 6,000 scattered on the St. F.X. football field to listen were his siblings and bandmates, Raylene, Jimmy and Heather Rankin. Cookie, the fifth Rankin in the band, is in Tennessee.

"John Morris must be guiding his fingers," Antigonish fiddler Kendra MacGillivray said as her younger brother, Troy, played a selection of Rankin's tunes on the piano. They were followed on stage by the Barra MacNeils, Rawlins Cross and Mary Jane Lamond.

In a spontaneous performance, Raylene led all the artists in an emotional finale, the singing of Rise Again, her signature song.

John Morris Rankin was to perform in the concert, part of a university-and-town-sponsored festival called Come Home 2000. Organizers decided to turn it into a tribute to him in the weeks after his death in a car accident Jan. 16. He was 40 years old.

His music, though, was here. Howie MacDonald, Dave MacIsaac and Tracey Dares played tunes Rankin composed on fiddle and piano. For brother Jimmy, who is just now starting to once again listen to fiddle tunes his brother cherished, it is a bittersweet sound.

"I associate John Morris with fiddling, so it's kind of weird to listen to that stuff. It brings back memories. I'm starting to listen to it now and it brings back good memories," said Jimmy in an interview before the concert. He has signed a contract with EMI and is planning to put out a solo recording by the fall. He couldn't describe the sound, only to say it's "fresh."

Sister Heather has turned to acting, landing small roles in films, the most recent in May. She, too, finds it difficult to listen to the music she spent 10 years making with her family.

At the end of the evening, his widow, Sally, and their two children, Michael and Molly, unveiled a framed photo of a smiling John Morris Rankin that will hang in the university's library. The inscription reads: "In memory of John Morris Rankin, 40, dedicated alumnus, loving husband, father and brother, loyal citizen, ambassador for his province and country, passionate towards his Scottish heritage, renowned musician and true friend."

A Wonderful Tribute - Dozens of Rankins expected to attend John Morris Concert

August 11, 2000 - Halifax Daily News - by Jo-Anne MacDonald

"Definitely, it's going to bring back some memories for the family, and it probably will be very emotional, but we're hoping that the evening will be such a wonderful tribute to him that it will be a happy occasion for them," says Kiely.

Raylene Rankin joins Lunenburg Folk Harbour Festival

July 24, 2000 - Lunenburg Folk Harbour Festival Website

The Lunenburg Folk Harbour Festival is thrilled to announce that Raylene Rankin will be joining the great lineup of performers set to take stage during the 15th Anniversary Edition of the Festival, August 10-13. Raylene Rankin will appear in a special concert Sunday afternoon at 4:00 p.m. on the Wharf Stage, one of the festival’s nine venue locations.

Raylene has recently been part of a special presentation with the Kitchener-Waterloo symphony based on the work of folklorist Helen Creighton with Scott MacMillan at the helm. Raylene will be appearing at the Festival with Scott MacMillan. Having left the Rankins in 1998, a year before their retirement, in order to spend more time raising her young son, Raylene’s performance will be a rare and special occasion. The National Film Board will film Raylene’s concert as part of a documentary on the legacy of Dr. Helen Creighton, entitled A Sigh and a Wish, produced by Donna Davies. A NFB film crew will be at Lunenburg during the Festival filming a number of the artists appearing at this year at the Festival whose notable careers have all been influenced by the music collected by Dr. Helen Creighton, including Raylene Rankin, Lennie Gallant, and Mary Jane Lamond.

The traditional music of Nova Scotia will also be strongly featured in a related special presentation of the Lunenburg Folk Harbour Festival. Our Ancestry In Song is a celebration of Nova Scotia’s musical multiculturalism, as documented in the Helen Creighton Collection, to be presented at this year’s festival through exciting and comprehensive concerts and workshops. Clary Croft (well-known folklorist, musician and curator of the Helen Creighton Collection) will lead a culturally diverse group of outstanding Nova Scotian musicians, singers and educators to present this special program. Funded by the Canada Council of the Arts, Our Ancestry In Song will present a special concert on Friday, August 11, as part of the regular evening concert at the Lunenburg Folk Harbour Festival, and several workshops throughout the Festival have been planned featuring additional material from the Creighton Collection.

For more information and tickets, please contact the Festival Office at 902.634.3180 or email info@folkharbour.com Visit their website at www.folkharbour.com for complete schedule, performer and ticket information. 

Hanging Garden and Canada Day Programming on CBC-TV

June 21,  2000

CBC Television celebrates Canada Day with a live mixture of special presentations and Saturday sports programming.

Live from Parliament Hill at noon ET (1 AT, 130 NT, 11 a.m. CT, 10 a.m. MT and 9 a.m. PT), Peter Mansbridge and Alison Smith host a News special featuring performances by Bruce Cockburn, Chantal Kreviazuk, Natalie MacMaster, Roch Voisine, soprano Lyne Fortin and Michael Burgess.

Live sports programming begins at 130 p.m. ET with NHL Cool Shots, a rink look at top NHL players. The World Cup Nokia Open Beach Volley Ball will be seen at 2 p.m. ET and from 4 to 6 p.m. ET it's the Women's World Softball Challenge Final from Brampton, Ontario. Saturday Report will be seen at 6 p.m. (7 p.m. AT and 730 NT).

Barrage, the hot young Celtic-fusion fiddle troupe from Alberta, is featured at 7 p.m. (8 p.m. AT, 830 NT) in Barrage A Musical Invasion of Europe, an hour-long special that highlights the group's amazing virtuosity and high-energy versatility.

Blue Rodeo, one of the most established and perennially popular bands in Canadian music, is featured in The Scenes In Between at 8 p.m. (9 AT and 930 NT). The one-hour special, the band's first, includes them in performance and behind the scenes as they work on their latest CD entitled Behind The Scenes.

The Canada Day evening gala on CBC Television, seen live at 9 p.m. (10 p.m. AT, 1030 p.m. NT) is a star-studded event featuring some of the country’s greatest talents from troubadour Stompin’ Tom Connors, to rock stars of the sixties, current chart toppers and the fresh face of new young talent.

Comic genius Cathy Jones of This Hour Has 22 Minutes joins Quebec singer and theatrical star Luck Mervil, who returns to co-host the show again this year.

Tal Bachman, recording star, two-time 2000 Juno Award winner, chart topper and heart throb, headlines the program. Country sensation Paul Brant, who also won a Juno Award this year, will be there to thrill the audience. Isabelle Boulay, the breath-taking best-selling recording artist in Quebec, and everybody’s favourite legendary Stompin’ Tom Connors will also be on The Hill to celebrate Canada Day.

At 10 (11 p.m. AT, 1130 NT), the moving and tragic story of a fictional Cape Breton family of miners is portrayed in the award-winning feature film Margaret's Museum. (Heather Rankin can be heard throughout the movie singing "Chi Mi Na Morbheanna"(Mist Covered Mountains))

As well, this Saturday, June 24th, The Hanging Garden will air on CBC-TV. Heather Rankin has a small role in the beginning of the film as does Ashley MacIsaac.  Released in 1997 and starring Chris Leavins, Troy Veinotte, Kerry Fox, Sarah Polley. Multi-layered psychological drama about Sweet William, the product of a dysfunctional family, who returns home after a ten-year absence to attend his sister's wedding. The film moves in and out of reality, and between present and past; a telling exploration of the complexities and emotional truths of family relationships.

A different shade of bluegrass
Atlantic Blue may be the most quintessentially Maritime album ever made

June 17,  2000 - Halifax Herald

By Stephen Cooke / Entertainment Reporter

The disc began as simply a special edition of CBC Radio's Atlantic Airwaves, combining some of the East Coast's best performers with superior examples of the region's songwriting, but it soon blossomed into a landmark cross-pollination of roots genres. Country, Celtic, Acadian and gospel all gathered to shake hands in a seamless meeting of musical minds.

The resulting effort, assembled at CBC Radio's Studio H on Sackville Street and labelled The Atlantic Newgrass Project by producer Karl Falkenham, was too good to let disappear into the ether after a single broadcast.

Like the project's title indicates, the foundation for Atlantic Blue is a progressive style of bluegrass using traditional players like J.P. Cormier on guitar and banjo and Ray Legere on mandolin and fiddle, plus backing vocals by Alan and Rick Spinney of Spinney Brothers and Close Company and Nadine Sarty and Angie Armstrong from the ECMA-winning bluegrass group Exit 13.

What makes the CD more universal is the choice of songs by the likes of Lennie Gallant, Ron Hynes, Rita MacNeil and John Morris Rankin, sung by a roster of guest vocalists including Cindy Church, Raylene Rankin, JeanMarc Doiron and Four the Moment's Delvina Bernard.

"Everyone we called wanted to be involved in this," says Falkenham. "There were lots of moments like when we asked Cindy Church to sing Ron Hynes' Atlantic Blue and she'd say 'Sure, he's one of my favourite writers!'

"Then I'd call up Ron and tell him Cindy was doing the song and he'd say 'I love her voice, she's perfect for it.' "

For the late John Morris Rankin's heartfelt tribute to his grandmother, The Eyes of Margaret, Falkenham called up one of his favourite local voices, Kevin Evans of the folk duo Evans and Doherty, to give the song the sensitive treatment it deserved.

"We actually recorded it a month or so before John Morris passed away, so it wasn't done as a tribute in that sense," recalls Evans. "It was just a great song that I wanted to sing the best I could.

"In fact, after we rehearsed the song, we did an initial test recording and Karl must have liked what he heard because he told me, 'That's the one.' And as it turned out, it was that first take he used on the record."

Send an email for info on obtaining this wonderful CD.

Howie's Brewin' comedy, music

June 8,  2000 - Halifax Herald

Celtic Brew bubbles over with C.B. talent

By Elissa Barnard / Arts Reporter Joella Foulds

When fiddler Howie MacDonald and his sisters were kids they put up a blanket next to the furnace and staged a play for neighbourhood kids.

Now, they're back at it, but the price of admission is higher than a nickel.

Howie MacDonald and sisters Marilyn and Cheryl have concocted Howie's Celtic Brew, a show of sketch and character comedy, traditional Cape Breton music and Cape Breton stepdance. It opens tonight in Glace Bay and tours Nova Scotia.

Directed by Bette MacDonald, produced by Rave Entertainment, the show ostensibly replaces the Cape Breton Summertime Revue.

Not exactly, says Howie, the show's musical director and principal comedian. "I've been thinking about this for years."

Howie MacDonald, of Westmount, across the harbour from Sydney, is best known as a fiddler. He toured all over the world with the Rankins, has put out two cassettes and six CDs, recently did a mini-tour of Nova Scotia with his friend, fiddler Ashley MacIsaac, and was in Halifax last week on the Scotia Festival of Music faculty.

However, he has been interested in comedy "since I was born," he said, during a break from the Scotia Festival.

"We used to hold concerts in the basement when we were kids. We had our father's lunch can and some hard hats and we'd dress up in work clothes and stuff," says Howie. His father worked for CNR.

Now he wants to explore the world of comedy, developing an act as a fiddler/comic. For that he needs to get out in public.

"You can sit at your kitchen table and you play music and you're learning and growing and getting better. With comedy you can't make yourself laugh, you have to have somebody there even if it's your kids."

MacDonald, who did a comic turn with the 1997 Cape Breton Summertime Revue, was in the Nancy White Jokebox at the ECMAs in February and performed this spring at the Ha!ifax Comedy Festival. But before he goes out across the country with a solo act as a fiddlin' comic, "I thought I should stay home and educate myself as to what I feel comfortable doing."

Howie also wanted to be closer to his wife and two daughters after summers spent away from home touring.

He approached Joella Foulds, of Rave Entertainment, producers of the revue, and called on his sisters in Westmount, Marilyn, a singer, teacher's assistant, and mother of three including a three-month-old, and Cheryl, a mother of two boys and a psychology student.

"He asked Mar and I if we'd be a part of it and we were completely honoured," says Cheryl, who step dances, acts in the comic sketches and also did some writing.

"It's a nice change for Mar and I. We're home with our kids a lot. It's a chance to get back into the music and what we love."

The show is different from the Cape Breton Summertime Revue, she says, because it focuses a lot on music which is fiddle-based though ventures into jazz and even gospel and features a piano solo by Tracey Dares.

"The music in the show is absolutely fabulous and there's a lot of dancing in the show. It's music and dancing and we added some comedy," says Cheryl, talking on the phone from the mall on her way home from rehearsal.

She, Marilyn, their mother, who was a MacDonald, Howie and another sister, Evelyn, used to play festivals in Cape Breton as the MacDonald family.

"Every summer we were on the road from Broad Cove to Glendale." Glendale was their big destination, since their grandmother, mother and uncles hail from Glendale. "My father's father played the fiddle. My mother and her brothers played the fiddle.

"Our grandmother, we're hoping she will make it to the show. She'll be 102 in September."

Apart from Marilyn and Cheryl, the Brew team features Tracey Dares-MacNeil, piano/dance; Al Bennett, band leader/guitar/bass/fiddle; Matt Foulds, percussion/comedy; Patrick Gillis, guitar/fiddle; sisters Helen and Dawn MacDonald who fiddle and step-dance and are no relation to Howie, and John Chaisson, vocals/guitar.

"I've got a great bunch of people who are enthusiastic about what they do," says Howie.

They are also a great support system.

"When I did the comedy fest, it was so intense. The comedians were backstage going over their parts. They were pacing and it was not as lighthearted as I thought. These guys take their work very seriously and I was the new guy on the block.

"This show is a step back from that. I have people supporting me. "

Howie got together with Sydney playwright/director Kennie Chisholm to write sketches, which Bette MacDonald helped to shape.

"The characters are characters myself and my sisters have been doing most of our lives and the sketches were written with these people in mind.

"We started imitating funny characters in the country," says Cheryl, "and one thing led to another and here we are.

Howie's comic influences include Jack Benny, "the John Byner type of comedy" in Bizarre and the early Rise and Follies. "I thought they were really cool. It was something I had never seen before other than at the house."

He adores Jim Carrey, saw his latest film about Andy Kaufman ("it was very good") and got Carrey's biography for Christmas. He calls Carrey brilliant. "I think he's original. He never stops improving, he's always got something new going on."

Howie, himself, has plans for something new in the future.

"This is safer for me at this point. The other ideas that are in the back of my mind are on hold. I have a lot of Star Trek humour going on back there," he says with a smile.

For now, Howie is anxious to see how people react to his Celtic Brew. "I can't settle down till it starts. We really don't know how it's going to go over. All we have to do is see what people think. If it's any good we'll be back in August."

"I hope everything goes well for Howie," says Cheryl. "Mar and I are so glad to be a part of it with him and we really hope he gets what he wants out of the show: a good turnout and lots of people to enjoy it. We hope people come and they laugh and they have fun."

For tour dates, visit the Band Members Concerts Page.

Howie's Celtic Brew

May 25,  2000

Cape Breton's New Music and Comedy Show
Produced by Rave Entertainment

Background

From 1985 to 1998 Cape Breton's music and comic talents were presented to the public annually through the Cape Breton Summertime Revue. The show toured the province, in some seasons the Maritimes and even across Canada. It served as a training ground for many of our most successful artists from the Rankin Family, Natalie MacMaster and Bette MacDonald to Bruce Guthro, Gordie Sampson and J. P. Cormier.

Since the Revue folded in 1998, there has been a void both for audiences and for artists. The proposed show, while significantly different from the Revue, will fill that void.

With a cast of 10, it will focus around the music and comic talents of Howie MacDonald. It will offer the two important elements of music and comedy with the addition of another extremely important element of the Cape Breton culture, ie dance.

Format and Concept

The show will contain the following elements: comedy (sketch & character), traditional Cape Breton music, dance, songs, special guests, and audience participation. The focus is on Howie MacDonald, his personal style of comedy, his characters and his music.  Howie is a very strong performer both as a comedian and character actor and as a fiddler.

The music will be very traditional with some interesting variations in terms of the songs given the rather jazz-like influence of John Chiasson. The energy comes from the music itself, not from loud or electric instrumentation.

Dance is a major component throughout the show building to a strong finale.

Each of the ten performers is given the spotlight at some point. Most have several roles (musician, actor, dancer). The format allows room for spontaneity and flexibility in the show...a particular element or guest may be present one night and not the next. Dancers may be invited on stage from the audience.

The set is very basic as in a real ceilidh. Costumes are simple...hats, jackets. The comedy is very 'Cape Breton' in its characters. Characters are portrayed by facial and body movements more than by costumes.

Artists

Howie MacDonald - Musical Director/Comedy Lead/fiddle/piano
Patrick Gillis - Guitar/ fiddle
Tracey Dares-MacNeil - Piano/dance
Al Bennett - Band Leader/Guitar/bass/fiddle
Matt Foulds - Percussion/comedy
Helen MacDonald - Fiddle/dance
Dawn MacDonald - Fiddle/dance
Marilyn MacDonald -Comedy/vocals/dance/piano
Cheryl MacDonald - Dance
John Chaisson - Vocals/guitar

For tour dates, visit the Band Members Concerts Page.

Springhill MusicFest nabs some of Canada's best

May 25,  2000 - Halifax Herald

Three-day event set for August

By Tom McCoag / Amherst Bureau

Springhill - Rita MacNeil's performance at the second annual Springhill MusicFestival this summer will cap three days of top flight East Coast music, the festival organizer promises.

"This will be the hottest event this summer in the Maritimes," Bernie Melanson said Tuesday as he listed the acts for the three-day event, Aug. 4-6.

Joining the Cape Breton singing star in the lineup are Blue Rodeo, Lennie Gallant, Kim Stockwood, Valdy, Gordie Sampson, Shirley Myers, Laura Smith, Barachois, Glamour Puss, Sons of Maxwell, the Fables and John Curtis Sampson.

"As you can see, this lineup is laced with ECMA winners; the best there is in East Coast music," said Melanson, who recently organized the Care Canada Concert for Kosovo.

"The great thing is, all of these great performers are all going to be here all at the same time, and not out west somewhere as they usually are.

"Those aren't all of them either. We have some surprises that we are working on. We will let you know about them at a later date."

One of those surprises could be Men of the Deeps. Melanson would only say he is negotiating with the Cape Breton singing group.

He would not say if Springhill songbird Anne Murray will be back at the festival she launched last summer in her home town.

Fans will see some changes, particularly in the length of time each performer is on stage. Last year, only headliners like Murray put on full concerts. Most of the other performers were on stage for only about half an hour.

This year, supporting performers will play for a full hour and headliners "will be on for 90 minutes plus," Melanson said.

In addition, the beer tent is being expanded into a second stage known as the Moosehead Melody Tent. It will come alive with various bands after each headline act ends at 11 p.m. The beer tent lineup includes perennial crowd-pleaser Matt Minglewood.

"This way we will have music going until 2 a.m. each night of the festival," Melanson said.

Organizers also plan to hold a songwriting seminar and a display of new musical instruments, including some computer-assisted ones.

They will also have a children's midway and a display of special effects by Streamer Effects International, an internationally recognized special effects company that does work for Disney World.

Last year's inaugural festival attracted more than 11,000 people. Tickets for this year's event are now on sale.

The first 5,000 customers can get weekend passes for $49.95 plus handling and HST. After those are gone, passes will cost $59.95 in advance and $69.95 at the gate.

Passes for children aged six to 12 are $20 in advance and $25 at the gate.

Tickets are available through the Springhill MusicFestival office and the Moncton Coliseum box office.

Scotland, PA up and filming

May 25,  2000 - Halifax Herald

It's spring and film production is beginning to heat up in Nova Scotia. You'll never know who you may pass on the street, meet at the gym, or find sitting at the next table.

Several films are already cooking, including the independent feature film Scotland, PA. which began shooting a football scene in Shannon Park last Wednesday. Film is rolling this week in Harrietsfield.

The Abandon Pictures of New York production stars James LeGros (Ally McBeal, Drugstore Cowboy, Born on the Fourth of July), Academy Award winner Christopher Walken (The Prophecy, The Funeral, The Dear Hunter), Maura Tierney (Liar, Liar, Primary Colours, Instinct), Andy Dick (NewsRadio, Inspector Gadget) and James Rebhorn (Third Watch, Snow Falling on Cedars, The Talented Mr. Ripley).

It is written and directed by Billy Morrissette.

Scotland, PA. is based on life in a Scotland, Pennsylvania diner in the early 1970s and is apparently a spoof on Macbeth. It will also star Heather Rankin as nurse Peg.

Producers are Richard Shepard and Jon Stern.

The Tattler has some correspondence with people who happened to be on a tread mill next to Jame LeGros and Maura Tierney at the Y.

The film is expected to shoot in the province until the end of June.

Reunited Reels
Four Cape Breton fiddlers will play a new piece at this week's Scotia Music Festival

May 23,  2000 - Halifax Daily News

By Sandy MacDonald

Is there no place too tony for Cape Breton fiddle music? The heel-rocking rhythms and lilting melodies have been tumbling out of the country dance halls and front parlours into the fancy concert halls and outdoor festival stages around the world.

They're among more than 20 guest faculty artists at the Halifax festival.

Now into its 21st season, Scotia Festival of Music invites the cream of young classical players from North America and abroad to expand their musical education through a series of master classes and concerts with world-class musicians.

But the learning experience is not limited to just the 50 chosen students - for a nominal $5 a session, the public can sit in on the open lessons.

"Everyone takes away something on their own level," says Christopher Wilcox, founder and managing director of the festival. Over a two-week span, the festival celebrates music with concerts, open rehearsals, master classes, lectures and recitals.

Among those "master" musicians this year are the four Cape Breton fiddlers - Buddy MacMaster, Carl MacKenzie, Howie MacDonald and Dave MacIsaac. This year's composer-in-residence, Scott Macmillan, has written a piece for four fiddlers and string quartet, simply dubbed The Set. He says it was inspired by Cape Breton dances held in packed halls in Glencoe Mills, West Mabou and other communities.

The 25-minute commissioned piece is built around three musical figures that characterize a typical dance set - two groups of jigs and a third of group of reels.

Macmillan has constructed what he calls `vignettes' within the set where the fiddlers trade off measures with the chamber players.

Macmillan is excited about the fusion, as he weaves traditional reels, jigs and strathspeys with his original tunes, sparking a melding of musical traditions.

"Having gone to the Cape Breton dances for so long, this was a nice form for this music," said Macmillan, from his country home in Cape Breton. "It was a fun piece to write, because I had the balance of the four fiddlers and the four (classical) players.

"The Cape Breton players will know the tunes ... the tricky part will be getting the whole ensemble into the rhythm."

Wilcox has been interested for some time in bringing fiddle music to his chamber music festival.

"My dream was to go back in the woods of Cape Breton and discover some of these guys myself - which was pretty stupid," laughs Wilcox. "Anyone who was any good was already known."

Wilcox started talking with Ashley MacIsaac last fall about performing in the festival.

But with the monsoon of bad publicity around MacIsaac's controversial New Year's Eve show, Scotia Fest backed off the booking and decided instead to bring on the four other fiddlers.

Wilcox moved to Halifax in 1967 to play clarinet with the then-Atlantic Symphony Orchestra.

He's developed the highly regarded music festival to where it now supports two full-time employees year round, with a budget of almost $400,000 a year. Sable Gas is on board as the leading corporate sponsor, contributing almost 10 per cent of the festival's total budget.

A huge slice of the festival's fundraising comes through its annual car raffles - last year Scotia Fest raised $162,000 through the car draws.

Through the festival, there are almost 60 events open to the public, from the master classes to the evenig concerts, including a gala Cape Breton ceilidh in the Rebecca Cohn.

Writing music for eight musicians with a Celtic edge and a classical approach is nothing new for the multitalented Macmillan. He also composed for The Octet, an eclectic ensemble of local players in the late '80s.

Macmillan has several other pieces being performed during the festival. Each night, a concert will be presented at the Sir James Dunn Theatre, featuring both the visiting students and the master players.

In addition to The Set (which will be performed May 31) Macmillan has written a piece for solo viola, a choral arrangement for the 35-voice Aoelian Singers based on a Sheree Fitch poem, some string quartets and a solo electric guitar piece called The Navigator, which Macmillan will perform himself.

"The festival is a chance to try out new things," says Macmillan, who attended in the mid-90s, taking some conducting classes.

Other guest artists this year include The Duke Quartet, a cutting - edge string quartet from England; virtuoso pianist Marc-Andre Hamelin and Cape Breton-style pianist Mary Jessie MacDonald.

To get tickets - For details on individual concerts, classes and tickets, call Scotia Festival of Music at 902-429-9467.

Carly Simon CD featuring Rankin Sisters released this week

May 14,  2000

Last fall, Cookie, Heather and Raylene worked with Carly Simon recording back-up vocals for her new CD.  Finally this CD is being released on Tuesday May 16th.  The CD is called "The Bedroom Tapes."  Look for it in your local music store.

Rankin lands gig with Simon, indie film

May 11,  2000 - Halifax Herald

Heather Rankin has landed a role in the indie feature film, Scotland, PA., which begins filming in Halifax next week.

But before she steps into the role as nurse Peg she will be heading down to New York for two weeks to work with Carly Simon.

Heather will sing with Carly for tapings of ABC's Good Morning America on Tuesday (May 16), on Late Night with David Letterman at CBS on Wednesday (May 17), The Rosie O'Donnell Show on May 22 and The View on ABC on May 23. Check local listings.

As for the film, Abandon Pictures of New York will be shooting Scotland, PA., well into June.

The producers are Richard Shepard and Jon Stern. It is written and directed by Billy Morrissette.

Rankin, Burgess to appear with Symphony

April 13, 2000 - Halifax Daily News - by Marla Cranston - The Daily News

Symphony Nova Scotia gets more worldly in 2000-01 season

April 13, 2000 - Halifax Herald - By Stephen Pedersen / Arts Reporter

Symphony Nova Scotia will take its audiences to the world's favourite travel destinations next season.

SNS launched its 2000-01 season on Wednesday in the Rebecca Cohn Auditorium. The orchestra, in full concert trim, played a mini-concert of samples from the upcoming season which begins Sept. 26.

The current season ends April 29.

The music by Glinka, Handel, Albeniz, Ellington and Tchaikovsky ended with Raylene Rankin singing An Innis Aigh (The Happy Island), a Gaelic song from the Helen Creighton collection. Rankin is scheduled to open the Maritime Pops series
Oct. 6 with Bernard Felix and Normand Formanger. Scott Macmillan will conduct the orchestra.

"There's a taste of everything on the program," said SNS President Bob Geraghty. "I think people like it. I think we are getting more appeal for more people."

The launch focused on works by an international roster of composers from England, France, Germany and Italy - but, strangely, not the USA - to be performed as part of the nine-concert, flagship Celebrity Series. Canada will also be represented.

Guest artists include pianist Anton Kuerti, violinists Philippe Djokic and Erika Raum, violin/cello duo Gwen and Desmond Hoebig, flutist Patricia Creighton and pianist Alexander Tselyakov. Conductor Grant Llewellyn returns for two concerts.

The game of musical podiums will continue throughout the season, though with guest conductors rather than conductor candidates. Principal guest conductor and artistic advisor Simon Streatfield will direct five of nine main series concerts.

Conductors Greg Burton, Howard Cable and Scott Macmillan introduced the music to be played on six different concert series, and five additional Holiday and Special concerts - a total of 40 concerts, not counting school shows and runouts.

Burton and Cable will split the four concert Traditional Pops Series and guest soloists include Joelle Rabu re-enacting Edith Piaf's last concert, and tenors Michael Burgess and David Rogers.

Macmillan conducts all four Maritime Pops concerts, presenting, besides Rankin, Felix and Formanger, Mary Jane Lamond, Slainte Mhath, Barachois, and old-time fiddler Frank Leahy.

Two very positive signs emerged from the season programming. The trend to featuring local and symphony players as soloists continues, and the Baroque series, with four concerts, each to be led by a baroque specialist, including Jean Francois Rivest, Bernard Labadie, Hank Knox and Jeanne Lamond, a sign that this already popular series is likely to get even more popular.

Popular is the word for a new series called Popular Classics. Conducted and hosted by Timothy Vernon, the two-concert series features cellist Denise Djokic in a concert of movie music, and pianist Peter Allen playing your favorite warhorses - the Warsaw Concerto and Liszt's Piano Concerto in E-Flat.

Also new is the two-concert family series. On Oct. 22 Burton conducts How the Gimquat Found Her Song, and Charles Cozens directs the orchestra for The Pied Piper on April 1, 2001.

A Martin Luther King Jr. Tribute, Handel's Messiah and The Nutcracker are back, as well as the popular season-ender Beer and Beethoven (with Howard Cable).

Celtic Heritage Magazine Tribute to John Morris Rankin

April 7, 2000 - Celtic Heritage Magazine

The March/April 2000 issue of Celtic Heritage Magazine contains a tribute to John Morris Rankin.  You can order the magazine online with a subscription via their website or pick it up at your local newsstand in Canada.

Rankins, MacMaster added to Kitchen Party Lineup

March 17, 2000 - Nova Scotia Kitchen Party

Jimmy and Raylene Rankin will each give solo performances at the Nova Scotia Kitchen Party next month, organizers of the national CBC radio show have announced.

The Rankin family has been in mourning and keeping a low profile since John Morris Rankin's tragic car accident two months ago. But Jimmy and sister Heather attended Sunday's Juno awards ceremony, giving a quick yet emotionally -charged acceptance speech for their best-country-group trophy, which they dedicated to their late brother.  

When the family group disbanded last fall, Jimmy Rankin announced plans to pursue a solo career, and we'll finally get to hear his stuff at Pier 21 on April 15, when the star-studded lineup includes P.E.I. fiddler Richard Wood and Newfoundland trio The Ennis Sisters.

Raylene Rankin left the band in November 1998 to devote her attention to motherhood, but performed at a cross-country series of stellar symphony shows with her sisters this past Christmas. She'll take the Kitchen Party stage on April 22, with other guests the Irish Descendants, Cape Breton fiddler Howie MacDonald and pianist Tracey Dares.

Also just announced is the April 8 show John Allan Cameron, Buddy MacMaster and Natalie MacMaster, who just picked up a best instrumental Juno for her album In My Hands.

Tickets for all three concerts go on sale today at 11 a.m. at Sobeys ticket outlets and the Metro Centre box office at 451-1221. Admission is $15, and many previous shows sold out quickly, so get in there fast.

And don't despair if you don't get there in person - the show is broadcast live each Saturday at 405 p.m. on CBC Radio One. (In person, you get an extra hour of entertainment, with the warmup bands starting at 3 p.m.)

In its fifth week with seven more to go, the series has been broadcast around the world, thanks to public radio in the U.S. and Scotland, Radio Canada International, satellite feeds in Europe, and RealAudio on the internet.

In the U.S., 32 public radio stations now carry the show and America Online wants to set up a link from its Atlantic AOL Canada site. The show's Web site - www.halifax.cbc.ca/kitchen party - has received 82,000 hits in the past month, and there's been a mountain of e-mail feedback from across Canada, the U.S. and the U.K., and even Japan,Turkey, Germany, France, and Denmark.

"The response is amazing. It's humbling," says producer Mike LaLeune.  This Saturday, listen for Acadian talents Grand Derangement and Ronald Bourgeois.

***Note*** Jimmy and Raylene will be performing in the "Minnie Session" portion of the show with Scott MacMillan.  It's about 10 minutes long, starting about 15 minutes into the show.

Interview with Jimmy Rankin

March 13, 2000 - Juno Awards Online

Now online at the Juno's website is an interview clip with Jimmy Rankin in the press room after winning their award.  You can view it by going here and then scrolling down.  You need the Windows Media Player to view it.  That can be downloaded from here for free if you don't already have it.

2000 Junos Country Group of the Year

March 12, 2000 - Juno Awards Online

Congratulations to The Rankins on being named the "Country Group of the Year" at the 2000 Junos.  Heather and Jimmy were on hand to receive the award.  The award was handed out during the non-televised ceremonies on Saturday March 11th.

2000 Juno Awards

March 12, 2000 - Canadian Press

Tal Bachman takes two on sparsely attended Juno Awards opening night

By ANDREW FLYNN -- Canadian Press

TORONTO -- The first night of Tal Bachman's first Junos was a double whammy Saturday -- the rookie musician picked up a pair of awards.

Like most of the big winners, Vancouver's Bachman wasn't there to pick up his awards. But the quadruple nominee will get a shot at another one tonight -- this year the Junos are divided into two separate evenings.

Bachman, 30, who scored a hit last year with his first single, She's So High, took best producer and best new solo artist.

"They keep telling me Tal was here, but I know he's not because I bump into him in bathrooms all the time ...," quipped co-host Kim Stockwood, accepting the award for best producer on his behalf.

Bachman lost in the best pop adult album category to Winnipeg singer Chantal Kreviazuk for her album Colour, Moving and Still, but the son of rock legend Randy Bachman is still up for best songwriter for his self-titled debut album.

In past years, the non-televised awards were crammed into two hours just before cameras rolled on the main event. To give the 31 off-air nominees a chance to relax and enjoy themselves, the academy presented their awards Saturday at a champagne dinner at the Metro Convention Centre.

But nearly half of the winners didn't appear to accept their awards, among them some big names: Cape Breton fiddler Natalie McMaster, the Tragically Hip, Alanis Morissette, Shania Twain and Bruce Cockburn.

Daisy Falle, president of the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, said she hopes more winners show up at next year's planned double-Juno nights.

"I think it probably takes time when you do it for the first time they don't realize what a great event it is," she said after the show.

"They probably thought it was more of the same thing when we used to have the hour in front of the telecast -- get up and get your award, sit down sort of thing. I think there were enough people here who thought it was a success."

Saturday's ceremony was hosted by Newfoundland singer Stockwood and Toronto TV personality Carla Collins and featured performances by Quebec folk band La Bottine Souriante, country singer Tara Lyn Hart, reggae artists Willi Williams and the Luge Sessions and young R&B pop duo Sangia.

Morissette won as director for her own video So Pure, but also lost to Kreviazuk in the pop adult album category. She's up for three awards tonight, best female artist, songwriter and best album for her latest, Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie.

Best single went to Kingston, Ont., rock journeymen the Tragically Hip for Bobcaygeon. Vancouver's Matthew Good Band won best rock album for Beautiful Midnight.

The year's best rap recording went to Choclair for Ice Cold. The Toronto rapper said despite the low turnout of winners, he favours the two-night Junos, "as long as they televise both nights."

"Every artist deserves to be on the televised awards," he said.

Best R&B/soul recording was Thinkin' About You, by 2Rude featuring Latoya and Miranda.

Reigning country queen Twain was named country female artist. The Rankins, who lost family and band member John Morris Rankin in a car accident earlier this year, took best country group.

"This one's for Johnny M," said Heather Rankin, accepting the award with brother Jimmy for the now-disbanded group.

MacMaster won best instrumental album for In My Hands. Best alternative album -- a hotly contested category that included much vaunted new bands Len, Danko Jones and Tricky Woo -- went to Julie Doiron.

Cockburn's Breakfast in New Orleans, Dinner in Timbuktu won best solo roots and traditional album while the group award in that category went to Kings of Love by Blackie and the Rodeo Kings.

Tonight's show, hosted by teen group the Moffatts (triplets Bob, Clint, and Dave and brother Scott), will still be the main attraction, with the big prizes such as album of the year and star performances, including one from Grammy-winning jazz singer Diana Krall.

This time Krall is nominated in just one Juno category, the newly created best vocal jazz album, for When I Look in Your Eyes.

Also performing on tonight's show are the Barenaked Ladies, Great Big Sea, Our Lady Peace, Amanda Marshall, Kreviazuk, Prozzak, Choclair, Sharon Riley and Faith Chorale.

Morissette is scheduled to present Sarah McLachlan with the international achievement award, recognizing the huge international success of the Halifax-born singer and creator of the all-female Lilith Fair tour.

This year's inductee into the Canadian music hall of fame is Bruce Fairbairn, the Vancouver producer who worked with many of rock's legends, including KISS, Van Halen, Chicago, Yes and Loverboy.

Fairbairn died last May. He was 49.

A special achievement award was given posthumously to early recording pioneer Emile Berliner, marking the 100th anniversary of his registration of "His master's voice" as a trademark.

Berliner, who lived and worked briefly in Montreal, was instrumental in the founding of today's major record companies.

Backstage interviews from both nights will be featured on the Juno Web site at www.juno-awards.ca.

School stage to be named in memory of John Morris Rankin

March 3, 2000 - Cape Preton Post

MABOU  - The Strait regional school board is acknowledging the accomplishments of the late John Morris Rankin by naming the stage at the high school under construction here in his honour.

The performing arts stage at the Dalbrae Academy will be named for Rankin, a native of the community. Rankin and fellow members of his singing family rose to international prominence as the Rankin Family, later The Rankins, during the 1990s.

Rankin was killed in a motor vehicle accident near Whale Cove, Inverness County in January.

The school board also announced that the library at the Dalbrae Academy will be named for the late Alexander Doyle, a former superintendent of schools in Inverness County.

The gymnasium at the Cape Breton Highlands Academy under construction in Belle Cote, Inverness County will be named for the late Archie Neil Chisholm. The well-respected local historian and storyteller passed away a few years ago.

CBC's Kitchen Party

February 17, 2000 - Kitchen Party Website

The Barra MacNeils, Natalie MacMaster, and Mary Jane Lamond are among the performers slated for the Nova Scotia Kitchen Party, an 11-week music series at Pier 21 on the waterfront (in Halifax).

Performances take place on Saturday afternoons at 3 p.m. starting Feb. 19.

Also on the roster are Newfoundland's Ennis Sisters, Richard Wood, Gordie Sampson, The Fables, and from Scotland, the Battlefield Band and Archie Fisher. Max MacDonald, the popular Cape Breton musician and comedian will host the series.

Each show will also feature guitarist Scott MacMillan with special guests including Buddy MacMaster, Felix & Formanger, Dave MacIsaac, Jon Goodman, JP Cormier, Jerry Holland and Lennie Gallant.

This music series will air on CBC Radio One and will be the first weekly live music/variety series broadcast in Canada since Don Messer and The Islanders 50 years ago.

The broadcasts will also be carried by public radio in the United States, BBC Scotland, Radio Canada International, satellite in Europe, and over the Internet in Real Audio (click on Halifax Live)

Tickets for the Nova Scotia Kitchen Party are available through the Metro Centre Box Office 451-1221 and all regular Sobey's ticket outlets. Tickets are $15 (+ applicable service charges).  Seating is limited.

Max MacDonald is the host for the series and Scott MacMillan is the host of the Minnie Session each week.

The first show will be February 19th, with the Barra MacNeils and Archie Fisher from Scotland as the features. During Scott MacMillans "Minnie Sessions", we will see and hear Dave MacIsaac.

Here's the lineup that has been announced so far:

Show #2 - February 26 - Mary Jane Lamond and Gordie Sampson. Newfoundlands Felix and Formanger will be the guest on the "Minnie Sessions" portion of the show.

Show #3 - March 4 - The Fables and Bruce Guthro.  The Minnie Session guest is Jon Goodman.

Show #4 - March 11 - Slainte Mhath (pronounced Slawn-cha Va), Mark Haines & Tom Leighton, and Rita MacNeil

Show #5 - March 18 - Grand Derangement, Ronald Bourgeois, Barachois.

Show #6 - March 25 - Battlefield Band (from Scotland) and Evans & Doherty.   Jerry Holland will be the guest on the Minnie Session.

Show #7 - March 26 (to air April 1) - Tommy Makem, JP Cormier, and Lennie Gallant.

Show #8 - April 8 - Natalie MacMaster and John Allan Cameron.  Buddy MacMaster is the guest on the Minnie Session.

Show #9 - April 15 - Richard Wood and The Ennis Sisters.

Show #10 - April 22 - Irish Descendents, Howie MacDonald & Tracey Dares, and Raylene Rankin.

Show #11 - April 29 - TBA

2000 ECMA's

February 7, 2000

The 2000 ECMA's were held last night in Sydney, NS.   Although the Rankins didn't win anything, Howie MacDonald and Dave MacIsaac performed an emotional fiddle tribute to John Morris Rankin.  They performed "Memories of Bishop MacDonald" in his memory, which was the first tune he recorded for the Rankins debut CD in 1989.  The unfortunate thing is that CBC-TV decided to cut short the tribute by going into commercial.  If you'd like to voice your concern about this, write  to the CBC.

Here's a list of the winners from the 2000 ECMA's:

Male Artist of the Year

Richard Wood, Dave Carmichael, John Gracie, Dave MacIsaac, Ian Janes

Pop/ Rock Artist/Group of the Year

Kim Stockwood, Greyloch, Anne Murray, Artists in Residence, Nicholson

Gospel Artist of the Year

Jericho Road, Cape Breton Trio, The LaPointes, The NS Mass Choir, Jamie MacKay & the Great Beyond

Female Artist of the Year

Mary Jane Lamond, Kim Stockwood, Rita MacNeil, Julie Doiron, Anne Murray, Natalie MacMaster

Alternative Artist/Group of the Year

An Acoustic Sin, Fur Packed Action, Nathan’s Flat, Chris Colepaugh & The Cosmic Crew, Smere

Instrumental Artist/Group of the Year

Richard Wood, Scott Macmillan, JP Cormier, Ken Enman, Danette Eddy

Group of the Year

Great Big Sea, Kilt, The Fables, Barachois, Sons of Maxwell, Glamour Puss

Jazz Artist/Group of the Year

Jive Kings, Jerry Granelli, Kate Hammett-Vaughan, Jeff Johnston,

Urban Recording of the Year

The Time (Jamie Sparks), Pierced Matron (Nancy White), Magic (Dion), Touch of Class EP (Classified)

Country Artist/Group of The Year

John Curtis Sampson, John Gracie, Kim Albert, Kim Gould, Sons of Maxwell

Blues Artist/Group of the Year

Denis Parker, Glamour Puss, Andy Cottle & Double Cross, Ian Janes, Barry Mack

Classical Recording of the Year

A Deux (Duo Concertante), S.L. Weiss: Volume 7 (Michel Cardin), Canadian Music for Clarinet (James & Penelope Mark), Valentina (Valentina Kotka), Reaching From the Rock (NF Symphony Youth Choir)

New Artist/Group of the Year

Dave Carmichael, Ian Janes, John Curtis Sampson, Fur Packed Action, Cory Tetford

Aboriginal Artist/Group of the Year

Eagle Feather, Morning Star, The Relatives,

Roots/Traditional Group of the Year

Great Big Sea, Kilt, Tickle Harbour, Christina Smith & Jean Hewson, Barachois

Children’s Artist/Group of the Year

Rik Barron, Duncan Wells, Kidd Brothers, Sunshine Sue

Francophone Recording of the Year

Encore! (Barachois), Acadilac (Acadilac), Roule, roule (Cayouche), L’Amour Comme Passager (Gerry Boudreau), Par Icite, pi par la (Harmonie)

Roots/Traditional Solo Artist of the Year

Natalie MacMaster, Mary Jane Lamond, Dave MacIsaac, Howie MacDonald, Brent Mason

Album of the Year

In My Hands -- Natalie MacMaster, Turn -- Great Big Sea, 12 Years Old -- Kim Stockwood, Lan Duil -- Mary Jane Lamond, Tear Down The House -- The Fables

Entertainer of the Year

Great Big Sea, Natalie MacMaster, Johnny Favourite Swing Orchestra, Kim Stockwood, Mary Jane Lamond

Single of The Year

Sorry -- Gordie Sampson, 12 Years Old -- Kim Stockwood, Consequence Free -- Great Big Sea, In My Hands -- Natalie MacMaster, Trip -- Gordie Sampson

SOCAN Songwriter of the Year

Gordie Sampson -- Gordie Sampson -- Sorry, Gordie Sampson -- Gordie Sampson -- Trip, Great Big Sea -- Doyle/ McCann -- Consequence Free, Kim Stockwood -- Stockwood/12 Years Old -- Veltese/Frempong, Natalie MacMaster -- Sampson/MacMaster/ -- In My Hands Sky

Video of the Year

Sorry -- Gordie Sampson, Bells -- The Rankins, In My Hands -- Natalie MacMaster, A Time -- An Acoustic Sin, Desperately -- Shirley Eikhard

John Morris Rankin Memorial Fund Established

February 5, 2000 - Halifax Herald

In an emotional ceremony (at the ECMA's), The Rankins' manager Mickey Quase stepped to the podium to announce creation of the John Morris Rankin Memorial Fund.

Rankin, 40, died in a highway accident three weeks ago.

"This fund is being established as a result of the overwhelming response received from the general public and the music industry to establish a lasting tribute to the musical legacy of John Morris Rankin," said a news release.

The fund is intended to preserve and enhance the Cape Breton musical tradition, which Rankin always tried to do in his encouragement of younger players.

The fund's board of directors includes his widow Sally and their two teenage children as well as entertainment lawyer Chip Sutherland and singer-businessman Denis Ryan.

Donations can be made out to Patterson Palmer Hunt Murphy in trust re: John Morris Rankin Memorial Fund and sent to Suite 1600 - 5151 George Street, PO Box 247, Halifax, NS B3J 2N9, CANADA.

2000 Juno Award Nominees

February 2, 2000 - Juno Awards Online

The nominees were announced today for the 2000 Juno Awards.  The Rankins are up for Best Country Group or Duo.  The other nominees in that category are The Wilkinsons, Farmer's Daughter, Prairie Oyster and Lace.  The awards will be handed out on Sunday March 12th and will be broadcast on CBC-TV at 8pm.  For a complete list of nominees, visit the Juno Awards official website.

Snow Segment dropped from ECMA awards show
Rankin Tribute Planned Instead

February 2, 2000 - Halifax Herald

The songs of Nova Scotia's Singing Ranger, the late Hank Snow, will not be heard in tribute as planned during Sunday's East Coast Music Awards Gala in Sydney.

Instead, the East Coast Music Association will feature a tribute to the late John Morris Rankin, who died tragically in an automobile accident two weeks ago.

In a press release issued Tuesday, the East Coast Music Association announced it has been flooded with requests from the public and the music industry to honour the life and musical contribution of the beloved Cape Breton pianist and fiddler.

Unfortunately for Snow fans, time is at a premium on the broadcast portion of the show, and as a result the planned tribute to the country legend, who died just before Christmas, has been dropped from the program.

The memorial was to feature performances by John Curtis Sampson, Cory Tetford, Denise Murray and John Gracie.

"The East Coast Music Association would like to sincerely thank those artists for their gracious understanding in a very difficult time," the news release states.

ECMA chair Marcel McKeough said it was a tough decision, but the association said it was imperitive that Rankin's contribution be recognized on the show.

"Members of the board, like all Atlantic Canadians, indeed all Canadians, are deeply saddened by this loss," he said in the relase. "We wanted to tell the world that we are proud to have known John Morris as a musical colleague and friend."

Details of who will take part in the Rankin tribute have not yet been released.

The ECMA Gala will be broadcast live to the nation on CBC Television and simulcast on CBC Radio Two at 9 p.m.

Cape Breton Farewell
A grief-stricken community says its final goodbyes to a homegrown star

January 31, 2000 - Macleans

By John Demont

"They lined up four abreast in the numbing cold outside the old family homestead in Mabou -- waiting for hours to say a final goodbye to John Morris Rankin. Inside the Red Shoe Pub, 100 m from the wake, old friends embraced and a doleful woman heading for the bar blurted, "He would have wanted us to have a pint." At the front of the room, a fiddler in dress shirt, tie and suspenders, along with a piano player sporting coveralls, tossed off some of the same reels, jigs and strathspeys the eldest member of The Rankin Family made his own. And on the hill overlooking the village, St. Mary's Roman Catholic Church -- where the world-famous Celtic musician was baptized and last week eulogized -- shone brightly into the night, lit by strobe lights and a simple illuminated cross atop its steeple."

[The full text of this article can be found in the January 31, 2000 edition of Maclean's.]

The Rankins Legacy
Rankin Family introduced Cape Breton's ancient party music to rest of the world

January 18, 2000 - Halifax Herald

By Andrew Flynn - The Canadian Press

They stole a little fire from their Cape Breton kitchen and then the Rankins lit a bonfire that caught and spread and warmed the ears and hearts of Canadians.

Breathing new life into the ancient, near-forgotten airs and reels of the immigrant Scots, the humble family musical group from tiny Mabou, would become a driving force in the nation's entertainment scene.

"The craze for Celtic music that hit Canada in the '90s was definitely started by the Rankin Family," says Larry LeBlanc, music historian and Canadian correspondent for Billboard Magazine.

"Every label decided at that point, 'We have to have someone from down there.'" Their talents first blossomed in Mabou, a small Cape Breton community literally bursting with musical tradition. There, the kitchen parties or ceilidh, would ring with the stamping of feet and the reels and Strathspeys performed by great traditional fiddlers like Donald Angus Beaton and Dan R. MacDonald.

Speaking and singing the Gaelic of their ancestors, the young Rankins were busy absorbing a truly venerable heritage.

Of the performing brothers and sisters - Cookie, Heather, Jimmy, John Morris and Raylene - John Morris, killed Sunday in a car accident, was perhaps the critical link to generations of fiddle-playing forebears.

"The spirit for all of that, the anchor, was John Morris Rankin, the person and the musician that he was," says Sheldon MacInnes, a Celtic music researcher at the University College of Cape Breton and author of A Journey in Celtic Music, Cape Breton Style.

"He was truly a link among the young fiddlers with the old time traditional style of the music."

"He was a touchstone to the older musicians in the area, carrying on a tradition that might have died when television in the '40s and '50s began to threaten it," agrees LeBlanc.

"The same Scottish airs were played in the 1640s and had a lot to do with the immigration to Canada of the clans."

The Rankins would become a bridge from the past to the future.

"The music here is a lot purer than it is even in contemporary day Scotland, that's what's really remarkable about it," says LeBlanc.

"There is a theory within music that the farther you get away from the mother root the purer the music tends to be. Part of that is because the mother body of music churns and changes."

The music of Cape Breton remained almost frozen in time, an enduring snapshot of the old world that evolved just enough to become it's own entity.

"That's why we're transfixed by an Ashley MacIsaac," says LeBlanc. "It really is a remarkable, unique musical style of swoops and bows."

The Rankins soared out of Mabou with their tradition-steeped sound in the early 1990s with two independent cassettes, The Rankin Family (1989) and Fare Thee Well Love (1990), later released by a major label. The first would go on to sell more than 100,000 copies, the second more than 400,000 - an astounding feat for any Canadian band.

Television appearances, cross-country tours and the respect of both the record buying public and international folk and Celtic performers would follow. They would dominate the East Coast Music Awards in their early career and win five Juno Awards. In 1998, Paddy Moloney, founder of the legendary Irish group the Chieftains, would invite the Rankins to record for his spotlight CD on Cape Breton talent, Fire in the Kitchen.

Ironically, the group was often doubtful about whether their music would appeal to audiences outside of their own region.

The Rankins' success was to be a catalyst for other musicians, says MacInnes, and performers like Ashley MacIsaac, Natalie MacMaster, Bruce Guthro and Mary Jane Lamond would follow in their wake as the floodgates of Cape Breton opened to the world.

"They have opened many doors for other musicians here and demonstrated that a very ancient music, a very traditional music, can have appeal universally," says MacInnes.

Their popularity would create other opportunities for Cape Bretoners, not only in music and the performing arts, but also helping to shape public policy in the region.

"(Their success) provided further appreciation and rationale for public institutions to lend some support to the whole Gaelic language scene," he says. "That's where the Rankin family perhaps would have been most instrumental in this community. And maybe beyond, in indicating that there is a Gaelic language here, a strong tradition.

"They have taken that tradition and moulded the music and the songs in a way that would be appealing to the general public so that people like myself, who research and write, could turn to the bureaucrats and say, 'Here you go, look at what happens when we support this stuff, look at the interest worldwide.'" 

John Morris Rankin dies in a car crash

January 16, 2000 - CBC Radio News

Report from CBC-TV (Real Video)

Report from CBC-Radio (Real Audio)

MARGAREE HARBOUR, Cape Breton - An accident in Cape Breton has claimed the life of a member of the Rankin musical family. John Morris Rankin was driving to a hockey game with three teenagers when his truck plunged into the water at Margaree Harbour Sunday morning.

There are reports that the 40-year-old man swerved to miss a pile of salt on the highway.

The teens were rescued from the icy waters. One is reported to have hypothermia and is in serious condition in hospital; doctors say the other two are fine.

Police say they tried for hours to rescue John Morris Rankin, but couldn't reach him in time to save his life.

John Rankin played piano and fiddle with the Rankin family. The group began performing in Mabou, Nova Scotia, in 1989 and rocketed to fame not long after, with the release of their second album titled Fare Thee Well Love.

As one of Atlantic Canada's most successful groups, the family rose from singing county fairs and church halls to selling more than two million of their Celtic-inflected records around the world. They swept the Juno awards in 1994.

They stopped performing together last year so members of the family could pursue independent careers.

Jimmy Rankin, one of John Morris' siblings, left the Family Farm Tribute concert in Toronto after being notified of a death in the family.

John Morris Rankin dies after truck plunges into Margaree River into Gulf of St. Lawrence

January 16, 2000 - Canadian Press

MARGAREE HARBOUR, N.S. (CP) -- John Morris Rankin, a member of the former Celtic group the Rankins, died Sunday after his truck plunged into the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
 
Three teenage passengers, including Rankin's son Michael, were able to escape from the vehicle and climb to safety following the 7:30 a.m. accident. They were taken to Cape Breton's Inverness Consolidated Hospital.
 
Family friend Emily Butler said it appeared that Rankin told the teens to jump out of the truck as it skidded towards the water.
 
"John Morris told them to jump and they got out," she said. "John Morris went with the truck."
 
Rankin, 40, died in the crash, the RCMP said in a release.
 
It hadn't yet been determined how the vehicle ended up in the water.
 
Morris Green of Nova Scotia Emergency Health Services said one of the teenagers was being treated for hypothermia and the other two appeared to be OK.
 
Family friend and musician Denis Ryan said news of the accident spread quickly through the Nova Scotia music community.
 
"It's awful, awful, awful," said Ryan, who played music with Rankin in the mid '80s.
 
"I've known him for 25 years, for Christ's sake.... Why is it always the good people that die?"
 
Ryan described Rankin as a dedicated family man and master carpenter who was like a younger brother to him.
 
"He was just a beautiful person to be around -- never offensive and could be awful funny at times. And he did have a great Celtic humour and wit about him. (He) could laugh and smile and have fun with very simple things in life."
 
Butler, who knew the Rankins for more than 20 years and considered them her extended family, said Rankin's siblings were devastated by the news.
 
She said the loss is a great blow for many in Cape Breton who followed John Rankin's rise to fame.
 
"He was a very wonderful and talented young man and we're all heartsick," Butler said from Sydney, N.S.
 
Rankin's brother Jimmy Rankin left a Farm Aid concert in Toronto after being notified of the death.
 
Family friend Russell De Carle, lead singer for Prairie Oyster, said he was stunned when he heard the news at the benefit.
 
"Oh God, it's just horrendous to say the least," De Carle said from Toronto following his set at the concert.
 
"He was a brilliant musician. It's a huge loss. It's unbelievable. I had an incredible amount of admiration for his playing. He was a brilliant musician, keyboardist and fiddle player."
 
John Morris Rankin played fiddle and piano with the popular musical family from Cape Breton. The group broke up last summer so its members could pursue independent careers and interests.
 
Over a decade-long, storybook career, the Mabou, N.S., family band rose from county fairs and church halls to become the most successful music acts on the East Coast through the 1990s.
 
The five siblings sold more than two million records, won five Juno Awards, including group of the year in 1994, and took its Celtic-inflected music to the world.
 
"We've had a great run," John Morris said last year after the breakup.
 
"It's been 10 years and they've gone by fast. Originally we planned to do this for five years, and 10 have passed.
 
"It's all been a positive experience for us."
 
The family's early independent success -- they sold 75,000 records literally out of the back of a car -- led to one of the first major-label music contracts in Atlantic Canada.
 
After being courted by several Canadian labels, they finally signed with EMI Canada and delivered five platinum records (each selling over 100,000 copies) through the '90s. Fare Thee Well Love sold more than 500,000 copies alone.
 
Ryan described John Morris as a "rock" who held the band together: "He brought stability. He brought leadership in a very subtle way. He was very, really a solid guy. I mean really solid. Fame and fortune really didn't shake him."
 
Brookes Diamond, a Halifax promoter who had known Rankin for more than 20 years, said he was "a lovely gentleman and a wonderful man" who loved country dances and was most happy at home in rural Cape Breton.
 
"He had so much to look forward to in his new life," he said.
 
"It's just an awful thing."
 
Besides Michael, 15, Rankin is survived by his wife Sally and daughter Molly, 13.

Star-Studded Line-Up Announced for ECMA 2000

January 13, 2000

Halifax – Cape Breton fiddling sensation Natalie MacMaster and Shaun Majumder – the hottest new comedic talent from Newfoundland – will co-host this year’s star-studded East Coast Music Awards Show, February 6, 2000 in Sydney, Nova Scotia. This year’s gala at Centre 200 features many of Atlantic Canada’s top performers from a broad spectrum of musical styles.

Featured in the show line-up are popular ECMA-nominated artists Kim Stockwood, Mary Jane Lamond, Gordie Sampson, The Fables, Ian Janes, Julie Doiron, An Acoustic Sin, and the riveting Fur Packed Action. Also, there is a classical performance by the acclaimed soprano Measha Bruggerman Gosman, and ECMA nominated pianist Valentina Kotko.

Other musical treats include the show opening, (which promises to surprise), and a tribute to the late, great country legend Hank Snow.

"With this many stars on our bill, Canadians can anticipate bright skies on the evening of February sixth," says Marcel McKeough, Chair of the East Coast Music Association. "The East Coast Music Association is thrilled to offer a show featuring some amazing talent and we are equally excited for all the nominees and wish them the very best."

CBC Award Show producers Geoff D’Eon and Michael Lewis, along with ECMA producer Jac Gautreau, are happy that the line up of talent represents the diversity of Atlantic Canada’s music scene, from pop to rock, to alternative to classical and celtic.

Broadcast live on CBC Television and CBC Radio Two, eight award categories will be presented during the show, including Entertainer of the Year. Viewers can now vote for their favourite East Coast Entertainer of the Year by calling 1-900-870-ECMA (3262) by February 1 (5 pm AST). Nominated for this year’s award are Great Big Sea, Johnny Favourite Swing Orchestra, Kim Stockwood, Mary Jane Lamond and Natalie MacMaster. Each call will cost 99 cents and a touch tone phone is required to vote. The Entertainer of the Year Award, sponsored by The Cape Breton Post, is the only award decided upon by the public.

Fewer than 400 tickets remain for the Gala Awards show which caps off the East Coast Music Awards and Conference in Sydney, February 3 to 6. Tickets are $35 and can be purchased at all Cape Breton Select-A-Seat outlets or by calling (902) 564-6668.

ECMA 2000 will also feature a new event for the Awards and Conference weekend. On Friday, February 4, ECMA will present Nancy White’s Jokebox at Glace Bay’s Savoy Theatre. This concert will be a celebration of the comedy song as Nancy welcomes Kim Stockwood, Gordie Sampson, Howie MacDonald, Terry Kelly, Bette MacDonald, Maynard Morrison, Jean Hewson and Christine Smith. Show time is 7 pm and the $17.50 tickets can be purchased by calling 902-564-6668.

Songwriters get chance to hear from the pros

January 9, 2000

SOCAN and the Songwriters Association of Nova Scotia present A Date With a Tape on Sunday, Feb. 6, during ECMAs at the Delta Hotel in Sydney (Nova Scotia).

Music industry professionals like Dan Hill, Ron Hynes, Jimmy Rankin, Steve Jordan from Warner Music Canada and Robert Ott from BMG Music Publishing Canada will offer direct and immediate feedback on songwriters' original material.

Participants are asked to bring a CD or tape of one of their songs and three copies of the lyrics. Names and phone numbers must be marked on the CD or tape. Material will be accepted between 10-10:30 a.m. and will be reviewed in random order from 10:30 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. Unfortunately, due to time constraints, there is no guarantee that all songs will be heard during the workshop.

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