Episode 5: Star Machine
Canadian musicians needed a way to stand out against Americans. So we launched our own star machine.
With the Canadian music scene being drowned by a flood of US imports we created novel ways to foster homegrown talent — our very own Star Machine launched the global careers of many Canadian artists.
AIRDATE: Dec. 13, 8 p.m.
Featuring: Gordon Lightfoot, Burton Cummings, Randy Bachman, Gary Peterson, Terry David Mulligan, The Guess Who, Crowbar, Céline Dion, Anne-Marie Withenshaw, Rebecca Makonnen, Pat Benatar
How Gordon Lightfoot clog danced his way into Canadian living rooms
Before he was a world-famous singer, he was a "famous country dancer" on CBC's Country Hoedown. As an aspiring musician working on his career, Lightfoot appeared as a regular on the weekly variety show from 1960-62 where he clog danced and harmonized. "The only reason I was on Country Hoedown was because I was was a crackerjack sight-reader and I sang in the vocals chorus," he told Elwood Glover in 1973.
'She's just Céline. She doesn't even need a surname.'
In 1983, teenage chanteuse Céline Dion was already famous in France, and in her home province of Quebec, but she had yet to break into English Canada or become the international sensation we know and love today. CBC producer Cynthia Grech-Kirkbride, who produced Céline's first English-language TV appearance, likened hearing her sing for the first time to "the Gold Rush"
When The Guess Who were TV stars
"Things looked just incredibly bad," says Burton Cummings. "Just worse than anybody could ever imagine. We had all left school, you know, and we had taken the big gamble, and it looked like we had really blown it."
A disastrous attempt at a U.K. tour left The Guess Who deeply in debt and their career in jeopardy. It took a surprise stint as the house band on a "teenaged rock n' roll show" to put their career back on track.
What a feeling, what a rush
The Maple Music junket helped Canadian musicians break into the European market by bringing Europe to us. For one band from Hamilton, it would change everything.
Bonus
Just a few years after their stint as the house band on Let's Go!, The Guess Who were back on the CBC as international recording stars. Here they are playing "Laughing" on The Wayne and Shuster Hour.
