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November 23,
2006
There’s a
kitchen party in heaven.
King of Cape Breton Music succumbs to cancer at 67
By STEPHEN COOKE,
Halifax Herald
He was
known as the Godfather of Celtic Music, the King of Cape
Breton Music, the Minstrel of Cranberry Lane and the Lord of
the Dance. But most people just called him John Allan, or if
you’re a true Cape Bretoner, simply "J’nallan."
John Allan
Cameron died early Wednesday morning at age 67 in a Toronto
hospital, after a five-year battle with a rare form of bone
marrow cancer and leukemia.
"Cape
Breton music lost the best friend it ever had," said Allie
Bennett, a longtime friend and sideman.
Cameron’s
son, Stuart, was with his father when he died.
"It was
his time and he was a fighter and he never wanted to give
up," Stuart Cameron said later. "He lived life to the
fullest in every regard."
John Allan
was a young seminary student from Glencoe Station on the
west coast of Cape Breton who found his calling spreading
the music of his home around the globe, starting in the
1960s.
From his
earliest albums on Apex Records in the ’60s through his TV
series on CTV and CBC in the ’70s and frequent touring and
appearances at folk festivals in the ’80s and ’90s, Cameron
was a tireless performer who could be counted on for
stirring songs, Celtic strathspeys and reels played on his
12-string "car-TAR" and a robust desire to make sure
everyone had a good time.
His
brother, John Donald Cameron, remembers driving John Allan
to a concert at St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish
and fretting over how his brand of down-home music and
folksy humour would go over in a roomful of tipsy students.
"Most of
them weren’t familiar with that type of music, but boy oh
boy, he had them eating out of the palm of his hand," John
Donald recalled Wednesday.
"They were
laughing and clapping. It’s not everyone who could do that."
At
Province House, MLAs had a moment of silence in honour of
Cameron.
Premier
Rodney MacDonald, a musician from Inverness County, said
Cameron was a national treasure.
"This
province and our country have lost a very special friend,"
Mr. MacDonald said in the legislature.
"He was
true to his roots, and that’s what people really respected
about John Allan," he told CBC Radio host Shelagh Rogers.
"He played the music that he grew up with. He played the
music that he loved, and he shared his talents. "And you
couldn’t help but smile when he was up onstage performing,
whether he was alone or with a group of friends. He had
something special about him. And that is a quality that not
every musician has, but he had something unique, and I can
tell you from a Cape Breton perspective, and a Nova Scotian
perspective, that people here feel a great loss at not
having him with us."
Bennett, a
North Sydney resident and friend of Cameron’s for over 35
years, was 13 when he first played guitar alongside Cameron
at a concert in Sydney River. From 1977 on, he accompanied
him off and on until the end of Cameron’s performing days in
2003.
While much
has been made of Cameron’s contribution to preserving and
presenting Cape Breton Celtic music on his landmark early
LPs, Bennett said Cameron’s priority was always making sure
people were having a good time.
"First and
foremost, he was an entertainer with a capital E," Bennett
said. "He would be the first guy to tell you he wasn’t the
world’s greatest singer, although he was a good singer, but
give him an audience and no matter what stage it was or
wherever it was, he entertained the people. We did a concert
in Edinburgh with Stan Rogers, there were six people in the
audience, and they got the same show that sold out the
Rebecca Cohn Auditorium (in Halifax) the week before."
Cameron
introduced Celtic music to the rest of the country through
his performances on CBC-TV’s Singalong Jubilee in the late
’60s, where he appeared with future Canadian superstar Anne
Murray.
"John
Allan definitely stood out with his kilt," Murray said
before a tribute to Cameron in Halifax in May 2005. "He was
on a mission to propagate the faith of Celtic music.
"We had so
much fun singing his songs and songs that he taught us. And
that unusual sound of the 12-string playing pipe tunes, he
played everything on it. He was a virtuoso on that
instrument."
Murray
also remembered Cameron’s delight in indulging his love of
Latin in casual conversation.
"He used
to speak on the set of Singalong and other places, too, he
would break into fluent Latin and do complete sentences. He
had a Latin saying for everything. But in those days, they
had to speak fluent Latin. It must have come from his days
in the seminary."
Cameron
also delighted in presenting other Cape Breton talent to the
world. He took pioneer Cape Breton fiddler Winston (Scotty)
Fitzgerald on a trip to Scotland and introduced the Barra
MacNeils at the Mariposa Folk Festival in Ontario in 1987.
The
Cottars, another Cape Breton group, dedicated a song to
Cameron at their Wednesday night concert at the Cohn
auditorium in Halifax.
Cheticamp
musician J.P. Cormier received his fair share of support
from Cameron when he was launching his career and returned
the favour by performing Banks of Sicily on the recent
tribute CD called Yes! Let’s Hear It For John Allan Cameron.
"What
we’re doing now is part of his initial dream, to make not
only Canadian music but Cape Breton and East Coast music
viable in the mass market, and he did it," Cormier said last
month during an interview at the annual Celtic Colours
International Festival in Cape Breton. " Just that in
itself, that was an insurmountable task, and he did it.
That’s what we can take from his life. That spirit’s going
to live forever."
Cameron is
survived by his wife Angela and son Stuart, a noted
guitarist in his own right who has performed with Ashley
MacIsaac, the Crash Test Dummies, Shaye and, most recently,
George Canyon.
Funeral
services will be held Monday in Pickering, Ont.
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