History Of Canada / I Remember Wayne

CBC Radio Orchestra; Mario Bernardi

The History of Canada / I Remember Wayne

Stuart McLean is a best-selling author, award-winning journalist and host of CBC Radio’s The Vinyl Café. Every weekend more than 700,000 people tune in to hear Stuart’s stories about Dave, owner of the Vinyl Cafe, the world’s smallest record store.
On the Vinyl Café, and in his years with Peter Gzowski on Morningside, Stuart has been an observer of everyday goodness of Canadian life. And it’s that off-the-wall approach that he brings to Stuart McLean’s Canada. Two concertos for storyteller and orchestra are presented on this CD with words by narrator Stuart McLean and music by Cameron Wilson.
For the first concerto, The History of Canada, McLean was inspired by Eric Nicol’s book, The Uninhibited History of Canada. McLean illuminates the history of a country that boasts a limitless supply of regional jokes, while composer/arranger Cameron Wilson draws upon the influences of cartoon music, PDQ Bach, Leroy Anderson and Canadian icon Celine Dion to create a score overflowing with the familiar leitmotifs of our national culture.
In the second concerto, I Remember Wayne, Mclean and Wilson once again put their creative talents together to tell the culture-clashing story of Wayne Gretzky’s fictional boyhood neighbour. Eddie Kovac has a love of music, particularly of the violin, while his parents cannot understand why he cannot be more like the soon-to-be-famous hockey star living next door. I Remember Wayne will remind us of the pressures of childhood, when we were called on to please not only our parents, but ourselves. Cam Wilson again delivers a wonderful musical flight of fancy that is rich in allusions, both classical and popular.
Concertos require orchestras, and what an orchestra we have featured on this recording. The JUNO Awards winning CBC Radio Orchestra is led by one of Canada’s most celebrated conductors, Mario Bernardi.

Price: $14.98