“A” Player of the Month: Tim Williams
“Every generation finds the blues, and that’s a testament to the music itself,” says Tim Williams over a glass of wine at Calgary’s blues house, Mikey’s Juke Joint.
Though Williams is an important player in the Calgary blues community, his music has reached beyond North America and into Europe. He has toured across the globe, produced three vinyl records and eight CDs under his own name, as well as appearing on countless records of fellow musicians and working as a producer.
Williams began his journey in southern California, where he was born in the late 1940s. By the time he was a teenager, Williams was already a published poet and covering ground in the coffee house circuit throughout California. At 20, he released his first LP recording, Blues Full Circle. The course was set: Tim Williams was a working musician.
Like most musicians, Williams has played a diverse spectrum of music. Although he started out on bluegrass, he became fluent in Delta bottleneck and Bluegrass Dobro techniques early on, and the blues is what he came to call home. Growing up around what blues fans hold in regard as virtuoso musicians, Williams was taken in by these blues fathers of today – artists such as Lightin’ Hopkins and T-Bone Walker – with no pretenses.
“(The musicians) were very supportive of me. There was no racial divide, they just accepted I could do it and accepted me as one of the musicians,” says Williams, in his natural, easygoing way of conversing.
What may seem like legendary blues accounts to some are merely aspects of the life of a working blues musician to Williams. There are no stories of grandeur here, only honest truths delivered from a blues man who’s been writing and playing for over 40 years.
A master of acoustic, slide and electric guitar, Williams is also accomplished on the banjo and mandolin, as well as being a vocalist. He left the US in 1970, moving to Vancouver, where there were “fewer people and fewer handguns,” and immediately became busy with studio work, teaching guitar, headlining smaller venues and opening up for bigger acts that came to town.
By this time, Williams’ body of work was encompassing western swing music and traditional country. The 1974 single “Careful Mountain Pony” did not earn its prospected sales, which led Williams to take a break from the music scene. He journeyed to the interior of B.C., where he worked on cattle ranches as a horse wrangler for a number of years, while still continuing to work on his music.
In 1988, Williams returned back to music, making an appearance as a player at the Edmonton Folk Festival. This highly visible festival resulted in the blues musician’s phone ringing off the hook, taking him right back to working as a full time musician.
In 1990, Williams began playing with Triple Threat at Calgary’s legendary blues bar, the King Eddy, while putting together his own electric band. Triple Threat, consisting of Tim Williams, Rusty Reed and Johnny V, went on to produce an album, The Terra Firma Boogie, that would earn them a Juno nomination.
Since then, Williams has continued to play with blues artists from all over, including Calgary’s own Bill Dowey, Donald Ray Johnson, Mike Clark, Amos Garrett, Sonny Rhodes and the late Back Alley John, just to name a few. He has produced albums for many local musicians, and has most recently been noted for his work on Junction City, the second album from Little Miss Higgins, who Williams describes as “Mae West meets Memphis Mini.” Williams is reuniting with Higgins at the Cochrane Folk Club for a one-night performance at the Cochrane RancheHouse on Saturday, November 14. Tickets can be purchased online at www.cochranefolkclub.com.
With the three of Calgary’s finest blues and roots venues – the Red Onion, Kaos and the King Eddy – all shut down, Williams is uncertain of the future of dedicated blues bars in Calgary, referring to Mikey’s Juke Joint and the Ironwood as two of Calgary’s remaining dedicated blues/roots rooms. “The club scene is really hurting…solo performing is such a dying art,” says an uncertain, but ultimately positive Williams.
Tim Williams will be busy in November, performing at the Ironwood Stage & Grill November 12 and 13, Cochrane Valley Folk Club (Cochrane) November 14, Full Moon Folk Club November 27, and participating in Blues at the Bow at the Bow Theatre November 28. He can also be seen at Mikey’s Juke Joint every Tuesday night when he’s not on the road. View the Article on the Beat Route Site!
Posted by Lindsay Wilson on Nov 04, 2009
November 11, 2009
By: Lindsay Wilson
Roots music, with a blues edge and a country twist, is set to take center stage Nov. 14.
Jolene “Little Miss” Higgins, accompanied by Foy Taylor on rhythm guitar and Calgary blues master Tim Williams on mandolin and guitar, will be sharing some musical talent with Cochrane at the RancheHouse.
Little Miss Higgins is performing for the folk club with blues great Tim William Nov. 14 at the Cochrane RancheHouse. (Photo courtesty of Jolene Higgins)
Higgins has been playing music ever since she can remember, and has been working as a full-time musician for the last five years.
“It’s a lot of work. You gotta stay disciplined and keep at it – practice and write,” said songwriter Higgins.
But it’s obvious she loves what she does.
“Even with the craziness, it’s an honour to be able to perform full-time,” said Higgins.
Higgins is noted for her skill as a performer on the stage. She blends her rootsy style, blues guitar riffs and gifted storytelling with a performance inspired by musicals from the 1930s as a way of engaging her audience.
Described by Williams as “Mae West meets Memphis Mini,” Jolene “Little Miss” Higgins delivers an authentic, earthy style of country-blues in a way that brings the listener back to a time when live performance was about gutsy lyrics and raw sound.
Williams produced Little Miss Higgins’ second album, Junction City, in 2007, which went on to receive a Western Canadian Music Award for Outstanding Blues Recording of 2008, and was also nominated for a 2008 Juno Award.
Williams, who is one of Calgary’s most highly regarded blues players, has worked as a producer for many notable musicians. He first met Little Miss Higgins in Yellowknife several years ago. They are currently promoting their newest album, Two Nights in March, with an Alberta mini-tour.
The recording of this newest album was done between the Amigos Cantina in Saskatoon and Engineered Air Theatre in Calgary.
Higgins and Taylor will be heading back into the studio in December to begin recording another full album and gearing up for a national CD release in the spring of 2010, with prospects of a European tour.
“Hopefully, that’ll create another wave for us to ride,” says Higgins.
Tickets to the show can be purchased either at Cochrane Coffee Traders, or online at www.cochranefolkclub.com.
Tickets are $22 each, doors open at 7:30 p.m. and the show begins at 8 p.m.
as printed in The Cochrane Eagle
Posted by Lindsay Wilson on Nov 18, 2009
“We are the Stormriders. I’ve taken all these hours in this crane and built this machine,” says Johnny Tornado, referring to his job as a crane operator, which has enabled him to fund his first ever CD release.
The project is no small endeavor for Tornado. He carefully handpicked a group of musicians to collaborate on this CD, which features blues musicians held in the finest regard by members of the blues community. All ten original tracks on the album are led by Tornado on vocals, guitar and steel; Tim Steinruck on bass and background vocals; and Adam Drake on drums. Several of the songs also feature Gaye Delorme on guitar and slide guitar, Big Dave McLean on harmonica (harp) and Wailin’ Al Walker on guitar and rhythm guitar.
Tornado’s style of rockin’ blues tells a life-long story of blood, sweat and tears. Originally from Ontario, Tornado left home at 14, and spent his youth travelling throughout Canada and the US with a guitar, busking on the streets and playing in smoky blues bars. He met some of the greatest American and Canadian blues legends, learning from the masters all the way.
“Steve Miller taught me how to play a B chord,” remembers Tornado, who has sat in over the years with the likes of John Lee Hooker, Wild Chet Butler, Chicago Pete, Little Sonny, the Downchild Blues Band, the Powder Blues Band and Burton Cummings. He also played with Canadian blues icon Dutch Mason. Mason also recorded “Goodtimes” with Tornado, the only recording Mason ever did headlining himself with another artist.
It was at a bar in Dallas at the age of 17 when Tornado got the hard-hitting advice that would follow him throughout his career as a musician. Freddy King was playing, and Tornado asked him what it was all about – where the music came from. King looked at the young Tornado and said, “Son, it’s from here,” tapping his chest and then buying the young blues musician a drink.
“I’ve taken a lick, or a chord, or a phrase from everyone along the way,” says Tornado. “I learned from the best and also from the worst. Sometimes you have to know what it’s like to be bad before you can be good.”
Tornado knows what it’s like to be bad. He lived a hard life, evident in his CD, Stormriders, which is a collection of ten original tracks telling the stories of travelling the long road of life, living the blues through both the music and a series of tragedies and even doing a stretch of prison time. He got out of prison at the age of 40, with full intentions of bringing the dream of music to a reality and living his life on the right side of the tracks. And now, for the first time, Tornado has put it all together and is bringing his debut CD release across Canada.
October was the month for CD releases in Nova Scotia and Alberta. Calgary’s CD release was held at Calgary’s own Shamrock Bar & Grill on October 17, where Tornado and the Stormriders hosted the Shamrock’s Saturday afternoon blues jam, followed by a band performance filmed live in HD video. Over the next few months, the plans are to hit Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Vancouver. Long-term plans for Tornado include touring the States and maybe even Europe.
“They’re only gonna remember the last show you did, so that’s how you have to do it, and that’s how I’m doing this CD release,” says Tornado, who is excited about his life’s work in Stormriders and is looking forward to wherever this CD release will take him.
Posted by Lindsay Wilson on Nov 09, 2009
