Jerry
Jerry Paquette is the man behind, in front and in the middle of Nanaimo’s music scene. So many, including me would have never accomplished musically what we have with out his skill, knowledge, humor and down right love of music.
When your sitting in a isolation recording room for the first time, a big microphone in front of you it’s comforting to look out the little window and see the engineer smiling and tapping along to the beat. He always made you feel compfortable.
I have been so fortunate to work with Ken Hamm and Jerry as a Producer/Engineer team.
There were times when we would just get together to visit. Jerry would talk about setting out on the road again, telling us of his travels with Susan years ago when they went across Canada playing music. He talked about supporting his daughter Alyse in her up and coming music career.
Now it seems Jerry is heading off on another road, one none of us know, there’s no maps, no GPS . It’s the road we’ll all travel one of these days. Alyse will carry Jerry’s music down the road that we can follow and will, she is so talented. I wonder if Jerry’s son Lucas will be the next Nanaimo Recording Engineer (here’s hoping).
Jerry became sick on New Years Day of this year, 2010. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer , one of the most aggressive.
He is with his wonderful family in the Palliative Care Unit @ Nanaimo General Hospital . They have been so generous in creating a blog so that all of us that love him and care so much for his family can check in and send our thoughts and prayers, share stories for everyone to read.
http://jerrypaquetteandfriends.wordpress.com/feed/
Tour in late May
Bill and I will be doing a tour in late May. Heading to Dawson Creek. Joining our friends to help take the cattle up to mountain pastures. Then heading off to Alberta and Saskatchewan. I’ll be posting the dates later on .
painting by Kelley Clark
Danny Barnes Pizza Box
For all the Danny Barnes fans out there I hope you know by now that his new album “Pizza Box” is coming out on Oct 13th. For the past couple years I’ve made Danny’s web site part of my music world, part of my practice time reading his blog etc. I’m so thankful for all he shares . It’s great when you run into someone you can really learn from..not only banjo playing but his outlook on life in general. He’s teamed up with Dave Matthews on this album. www.dannybarnes.com
Change
Hold onto your hat, or it’ll blow like a tumble weed
Rollin’ down highway 2 headed east
The tall ghost rider and the banks of the Oldman slip away
Change, change, change…
Red ribbon and black hair tangled in the wind
I know your aim is to save the Oldman
Cause if they dam the river it will change the land forever
Change, change, change…
Water is the blood that runs through our history
don’t spill a drop…
the water is valuble
Count wind turbines high on a hill
harness it up, the wind is valuble
Change, change, change…
Hold onto your hat or it will blow like a tumbleweed
Rollin’ down highway 2 headed east
The tall wind turbines providing all the power we will need
for this
Change, change, change…
May 1976 Native Funeral of Nelson Small Legs Jr. Southern Alberta
the song is called “Change”, I wrote it a few years ago after driving through my beloved Southern Alberta homeland both horrified and impressesd with the wind chargers and for my dear friend Nelson who fought against so much and gave his life as a martyr, attempting to stop the McKenzie Valley Pipeline and the Oldman River Dam from being built. He was the leader of the American Indian Movement in Alberta. He was a leader of his people. I wish to this day he was here, he could have made a change…
Three Rivers
The road leads straight to the Yakima. From my bedroom window I can watch the Horse Heaven Hills change color with the Sunrise
and I thought this was a good place, on the road that leads straight to the Yakima
Three Rivers, three cities and then they built Hanford or was it Hanford that built the cities and kept the people thinking opportunity is close and the air they breath is still pretty clean and the water won’t burn you, it’s so muddy you can’t tell if it’s changing…
but we used to swim in the Yakima and we’d pack a lunch and go looking for rattlesnakes
me and my Sister
