Global Courant 2023-05-02 06:26:00
Legendary Canadian folk singer-songwriter Gordon Lightfoot has passed away at the age of 84.
Victoria Lord, a representative of the family, says the musician behind classic Canadian ballads “Early Morning Rain” and “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” died Monday night in a Toronto hospital.
His cause of death was not immediately available.
The Orillia, Ontario native, rose to fame in the early 1960s after a move to Toronto opened doors to Yorkville’s thriving music scene and brought him into contact with fellow folks Ian and Sylvia Tyson. They became great admirers of his work and covered two of his tracks.
His debut album “Lightfoot!” ushered in a new folk voice, and by the turn of the century he was moving into the pop scene fairly effortlessly, first appearing on the Billboard pop chart with 1971’s “If You Could Read My Mind.”
Lightfoot’s popularity peaked in the mid-1970s when both his single and album “Sundown” topped Billboard—his first and only time doing so.
But his chart hits did little to slow him down in the final decades of his career as he built a reputation as one of the staunchest road musicians, despite several health problems.
This report from The Canadian Press was first published on May 1, 2023.
