Tuesday, December 5, 2000
Voicing their support
Legendary song-smiths band together to promote a Landmine Free World
By JANE STEVENSON -- Toronto Sun
(Feat. Emmylou Harris, Steve Earle, John Prine, Nanci Griffith, Mary Chapin Carpenter and Bruce Cockburn) Massey Hall, Toronto Monday, December 4, 2000
TORONTO -- The concept was simple enough. And surprisingly powerful too.
Gather six extraordinary singer-songwriters and get them to perform together in an intimate acoustic setting all in the name of a good cause.
So it went last night at Massey Hall where event organizer Emmylou Harris was joined by the awe-inspiring lineup of Bruce Cockburn, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Steve Earle, Nanci Griffith and John Prine in the third of five Concerts For A Landmine Free World taking place this week in Canada and the U.S.
And like almost every benefit where several headliners have to share the same stage -- in this case they sat in a dimly lit semi-circle with their acoustic guitars in stands beside them -- everyone had their designated roles.
Harris, who lovingly concentrated on material from her latest collection, Red Dirt Girl (for which she wrote almost all of the material), was the evening's prettiest sounding performer while Prine -- the Godfather of this collection of folk-country artists -- was definitely the sentimental favourite.
Harris opened the show by reminding the sold-out crowd that it was Canada who initiated the global treaty to ban antipersonnel landmines three years ago. (This same group commemorated the treaty's third anniversary on Sunday night with a show in Ottawa at the National Arts Centre.)
After giving ourselves a warm round of applause, the performers got down to business beginning with Harris' The Pearl on which Cockburn kicked in on guitar and Carpenter and Griffith harmonized sweetly.
In fact, Cockburn proved to be the evening's most consistent collaborator playing on virtually everyone else's tunes and even furnishing a guitar solo here and there. (He also forget some of the words to one of his own songs but later redeemed himself during The Mines Of Mozambique and World Of Wonders.)
Surprisingly, there wasn't more of this sharing of talent throughout the night which stretched over two hours and included a half-hour intermission during which patrons were encouraged by Harris to buy brightly coloured silk scarves made by some of Cambodia's female victims of landmines.
Earle, meanwhile, referred to himself as "the designated loud guy."
And while it's true he provided the most noise of the night, other than Griffith when she got everyone to join in on Pete Seeger's If I Had A Hammer, he also snuck in the heart-wrenching ballad, Goodbye, with Harris trading verses.
"If I write more pretty songs, then my audience is a lot less hairy and ugly," he joked.
Meanwhile, Earle's other tunes, You Know The Rest, and The Truth -- the latter played on banjo -- had the most kick of any played last night and certainly came across better than his outing at Convocation Hall this summer which was marred by a lousy sound.
The evening's biggest emotional moment came during Griffith's Travelling Through This Part Of You, a new song she wrote for her ex-husband, a Vietnam Veteran who served in 1969, after she visited Vietnam and Cambodia this past January.
Politics were kept to a minimum, however, and a brief appearance by Bobby Muller, the co-founder of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, only provided a startling reminder on how lucky we are to live in Canada as he recited horrifying statistics about landmine-plagued life in Cambodia.
Providing the most fun was Prine as he made his way through such classics as Angel From Montgomery and It's A Big Old Goofy World with all the women jumping in on background vocals.
Still, it was Harris' deeply personal material which really connected with the crowd, whether it was Hour Of Gold, a song about "old love," inspired by her parents relationship, or Bang The Drum Slowly, a tribute to her late father.
Review by JAM! Showbiz