Jun. 30, 2010 - Issue #767: The Bestest of Edmonton 2010
Prevue
Everything is rosey
Musician gets approval from Don Cherry
Jay Aymar / Supplied
The first letter to Cherry was to get the hockey icon's permission to record the song "My Cherry Coloured Rose," a song written in the first person about Cherry's grief over the loss of his wife Rose. Aymar's girlfriend at the time mailed a copy of it to the CBC and within a month, Aymar got a phone call.
"Don called me about a month later, and I told him to f-off. I thought it was my buddy putting me on.
"He laughed and said, 'No, it's actually me and we're really moved by the song.' So he gave me his permission to record it.
"Then about a year after that, I was reading about Tyson in The Globe and Mail, his life being a legendary songwriter and inspiration to a lot of [artists] out there. I wrote him a letter, just a few lines saying he's a Canadian hero, and gave him a homemade CD. He called me on my 40th birthday and said he liked the song, and asked if he could record the song."
Aymar is on tour supporting his newest album, Halfway Home, a concise 10-song folk record from a versatile and prolific songwriter known for expansive albums that can cover rock, blues, country and folk.
"I was right in the middle of deciding which songs would go on the record and recording them when I had the call from Ian to record 'My Cherry Coloured Rose'. Through that connection I was put in touch with publicist Richard Flohil, and he became involved in listening to my songs and guiding me gently, saying, 'This is what you should be focusing on, a more concise record with very similar sounding songs—to make a folk record, because generally my previous releases would have been all over the map: a rock song next to a folk song. I'm just finished up a new record as we speak, and the songs are in a very different vein. But this one is very folk-driven."
Originally from Sault St Marie, ON, the unpretentious performer continues to be inspired by his fellow folk icons Gordon Lightfoot, Murray McLauchlan, Fred Eaglesmith and Bob Dylan. Like his predecessors, a quick glance at his tour schedule reveals Aymar's relentless work ethic, reaching out to fans the old-fashioned way: one at a time.
"This CD is doing really well for me, I've already sold 1300 units off the stage—'the hard way,'" he laughs. "It's doing well and I'm getting really great response and I couldn't be happier. It's been a very exciting year, I'm just loving it." V
Jay Aymar
Fri, Jul 2 (8:30 pm)
Early Stage Saloon (Stony Plain)
Sat, Jul 3 (8:30 pm)
Glenora Bistro vueweekly.com comments: powered by Disqus
Privacy Policy:
Vue respects your privacy. We will not forward your personal information to any other organization except as required by law, and will use your e-mail address only to respond to your comments. We reserve the right to edit and remove comments for length, clarity and/or if they are illegal or inappropriate. Your email address is never shown to visitors to vueweekly.com. Read the whole policy at: http://vueweekly.com/privacy
Comments policy
Comments go online directly without first being seen or reviewed by editors at Vue. Don't personally attack people, don't be defamatory, don't be spam-atory, don't hawk your band, don't pretend to be someone else, be clear, be on topic, be nice. Read our extended comments policy here. »
We use Disqus for our comments system. What's that all about?
We found that managing the comment community at Vue was easier to do with a system like Disqus. If this isn't straightforward to you, get help here.