First, Awards

I’m presenting myself the ‘Most Moribund Website Award’ from a vast field of 47,000 entries. Most, apparently from prepubescent boys who launched webpages full of toilet humour, discovered drugs, and forgot their URL’s. A proud moment for me…

Seriously now…I won a Leo Award (Western Canadian Film) in 2001 for the score for ‘Lunch With Charles’ Geoff Kelly, Tom Landa & I were nominated for a Best Song Genie this February for ‘Parting Glass’ from the same film. Although Bif Naked did her best (singing), we lost out to Ron Sexsmith. A swell guy, and underappreciated despite kudos from such obscure sources as Elvis Costello & Sir Paul McCartney. Congratulations, Ron.

2001 in review -

A varied year to be sure. I came out of my cave for longer spells than usual and performed in a variety of groups: Cowboy Junkies from April - July, Colin James in November/December, Uzume Taiko in May and Sharkskin whenever we could.

Highlights include a police escort to ‘Dunkin Donuts Earth Day’ (I’m not kidding) in Boston with Shawn Colvin, Blues Traveller and others; a wedding gig, also with the Junkies at the Palace Hotel in NYC - we were flown on a private jet from Toronto to New York, the pilot apologized for the early lobby call on Sunday, but “he had to get the plane back to take Bill Clinton & David Stern to Philly for the NBA finals”…; getting thundered out of Central Park at a Canada Day show on July 1; gigs with Colin James & Colin Linden in southern Ontario; and surviving New Year’s Eve (day) on skis with Pat Steward, Craig Northey and the Colin James gang.

I also managed to fit in some composing in my new pro tools studio, scoring several episodes of Da Vinci’s Inquest.

The vintage key collection is ever-growing, featuring german clavs, italian mini vibraphones, an obscure japanese key bass with mother-of-toilet-seat trim, and yet more Hammonds. They were all put to work on some recent demos and tracks on Bob Kemmis’ new album.