Tyson can’t sing, but can still perform
Cowboy singer practises his guitar and uses strength of story telling to perform
Life hasn’t been the same for 84-year-old Ian Tyson since openheart surgery two years ago in Calgary.
“It changed everything, basically,” he says from his ranch in Longview, Alberta. “My balance is gone. I’m not a cowboy anymore, thank goodness, because I wouldn’t be able to handle it.
“Shit happens. You must have discovered that, even in Lotus Land out on the coast.”
Then there’s the voice, which he had regained shortly before the heart surgery.
“What voice?” he responds with a hoarse rasp. “When I had the heart attack, they stuck a lot of machinery down my larynx into my vocal cords and stuff. It totally f---ed it, and it ain’t comin’ back.
“I miss my falsetto. I can sort of fake my yodelling. I’ve had to learn a whole new methodology on stage. I’m a pretty good storyteller and I blend that in. It seems to work. I haven’t had anyone ask for their money back.”
Tyson, the songwriter, can draw upon a vast catalogue, including Four Strong Winds, Somebody Soon, and Summer Wages, recorded with his former wife, Sylvia (Fricker) Tyson, and the classic, Navajo Rug.
Writing is much more difficult these days. “The muse may have moved on,” he says.
Tyson released his last album, Carnero Vaquero, in 2015, and the single, You Should Have Known, written by Nashville’s Pat McLaughlin, in 2017.
He said he regularly practises his guitar to compensate for this vocal shortcomings. “Back in the old days, I might go for a month without pickup on a guitar. I can’t do that anymore. You use it or lose it.”
Tyson is teaming up with a younger Alberta singer-songwriter, roots-country artist Corb Lund, 48, to help “lighten the load” on a forthcoming short series of concerts. The two will present “an evening of cowboy songs and stories” on Thursday, Jan. 11, at 8 p.m. at the Vogue Theatre.
“We’ve been doing this off and on for 10 years now,” Tyson says. “We choreograph ourselves as we go along. I think it will be quite interesting.”
Tyson has long been a fixture of what he calls the vertical cowboy culture that extends north-south across the Canadian and American west — but crossing the border has become problematic post 9/11.
“It has to be a pretty good offer or I won’t even go down there anymore. It used to be really fun to go to the U.S. They’d always cut the cowboy lots of slack, but that’s gone.”
Asked about his legacy, he says he leaves a body of work that he hopes stands the test of time. “And it has. It’s been good.” Not bad, he says, given the lack of radio play in recent years.
“You just hope that the people who know and admire your work will come,” he says. “I’m fortunate, that’s exactly the way it’s been. People do come.”
A recipient of the Order of Canada, Tyson was born in Victoria in 1933, and his sister, still living there, is his last family connection to the province.
I’ve had to learn a whole new methodology on stage. I’m a pretty good storyteller and I blend that in. It seems to work.