Which way you goin’, Junos?

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 26/05/2022 (1570 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Watching the annual Juno Awards two weekends ago only reinforced my alienation from the current crop of Canadian recording artists and pop stars. I could probably name a handful of them at best. That doesn’t diminish my respect for their achievements and the acclaim they bring to our recording industry.

But each year as I scan the list of winners, I am increasingly dismayed at the choices for induction into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame. While I applaud the induction this year of R&B singer Deborah Cox, the first Black female solo Canadian artist in the Hall, I remain increasingly disappointed at the myopic decision-making of the members of the Hall of Fame induction committee. Their sense of history appears to extend only 25 years into the past as if no one of any significance mattered before that time.

The list of worthy Canadian recording artists who helped build a successful homegrown music industry, the industry that helped give more recent inductees a chance at success, yet who continue to be overlooked when it comes to being honoured by induction into the Hall of Fame, continues to grow. With each year, more and more of these groundbreaking Canadian artists pass away never having received a nod of respect and admiration from the Canadian music industry.

One of the saddest cases of the flawed Hall of Fame induction process was passing over Canada’s first teen idol, Bobby Curtola, year after year. Curtola helped foster a homegrown Canadian music industry from tiny Port Arthur, Ont., selling his records from the trunk of his car at personal appearances before achieving national success. Curtola was our first coast-to-coast pop star. It was only after he passed away that the selection committee deemed him worthy of inclusion, denying him the opportunity while still alive to be acknowledged by both his peers and fans for one last accolade.

Already this year we lost Susan Jacks, a member of the multimillion-selling British Columbia-based pop music group the Poppy Family alongside her husband, Winnipeg-born Terry Jacks, whose composition Which Way You Goin’ Billy, graced by Susan’s evocative voice, sold some 3½ million records. It remains a staple of oldies radio to this day. Further big hits including Beyond the Clouds, Where Evil Grows and That’s Where I Went Wrong were all Top 10 hits. Terry then left the group and in 1974 scored an international mega-hit with Seasons in the Sun selling over 13 million records, at that time the biggest-selling Canadian single. Neither the Poppy Family nor Terry have been recognized by the Canadian Music Hall of Fame.

The list of worthy Canadian recording artists somehow forgotten by the Hall of Fame is impressive: Doug & the Slugs (Doug Bennett passed away in 2004); Trooper, who remain Canada’s classic-rock party band; Streetheart (Kenny Shields has also passed away); Lighthouse; Loverboy; Luba; multi-Juno-winning trio the Stampeders; pop hitmakers Glass Tiger; singer/songwriter Valdy; Parachute Club, whose hit single Rise Up has gone on to become an anthem for the LGBTTQ+ community; ’50s Canadian rock ‘n’ roll pioneer Jack Scott (What in the World’s Got Over You); singer/songwriter Bonnie Dobson (her song Morning Dew has been recorded by the likes of the Grateful Dead, Rod Stewart and Robert Plant, to name a few); country swing band Prairie Oyster; big-band leader Tommy Banks; multiple hit-making Manitoba Indigenous band C-Weed; ’50s pop star Gisèle Mackenzie; Our Pet Juliette; blues guitarist extraordinaire Jeff Healey; singer/songwriter Gene MacLellan (Snowbird, Put Your Hand in the Hand), the venerable Downchild Blues Band (with Winnipegger Jane Vasey, now deceased); the country gentleman Tommy Hunter; bilingual singer Lucille Starr, who became Canada’s first female country singer to sell a million records with The French Song selling five million copies worldwide; Crash Test Dummies; Edward Bear; pianist Frank Mills (Music Box Dancer); Chantal Kreviazuk; Celtic music maven Loreena McKennitt, who has sold over 13 million records and toured worldwide; country singers Myrna Lorrie, Terri Clark and Michelle Wright along with Farmer’s Daughter (with Brandon’s Angela Kelman); renowned folk music authority singer/songwriter Oscar Brand; Winnipeg-born Bob Nolan (who composed Tumblin’ Tumbleweeds and Cool Water as a member of the Sons of the Pioneers with Roy Rogers); East Coast folksinger/songwriting legend Stan Rogers; and blues veterans Big Dave McLean and Colin James. And that’s just scratching the surface.

A close friend who served for a time on the Canadian Music Hall of Fame induction committee intimated to me that the overriding priority in deciding who gets in and who doesn’t these days has become how it will look on television. I guess old people don’t look good on television.

I can remember when the annual Junos Awards were held in a Toronto hotel ballroom with a homespun quality to them. They weren’t glitz and there were no red carpets. Enigmatic Alberta-born cowgal singer/songwriter k.d. lang stormed the stage in cowboy boots and a wedding dress. No one was asking Anne Murray who she was wearing (in all likelihood it was Eaton’s) and the most visible accoutrement in the audience was Rompin’ Ronnie Hawkins 10-gallon cowboy hat. In recent years, however, the Junos have taken a page from the mega-events of a variety of American music industry celebrations and gone for lights, glitz, glamour and celebrity. The only difference between the Grammys and the Junos these days are the names of the winners.

Don’t misconstrue the point I’m making. I celebrate the achievements of recent Canadian music artists. They do our country proud. But let’s not forget those who came before and helped to create the platform that many of those current artists have launched their careers from. They, too, deserve to be remembered, recognized for their contributions, and honoured before it’s too late.

John Einarson is a music history writer of 16 books and teaches music history courses at the Manitoba Conservatory of Music & Arts, University of Winnipeg.