Gene MacLellan: compiling his life's work took detective skills

Performing Arts & Entertainment in Canada, Fall, 1997 by Karen Bell

Fraser Hill, an engineer and producer at EMI Music Canada, undertook to put together Lonesome River, a CD compilation of Gene MacLellan's songs. Of course, Hill mined EMI and Capitol vaults for the tunes, but the job involved much research and detective work.

He talked to former cast members of Singalong Jubilee and Don Messer's Jubilee, TV shows with which MacLellan had been associated in the 60s and 70s. He used their recollections as clues to track down various recordings in Nashville, Los Angeles, the CBC, the National Library in Ottawa and the Nova Scotia Public Archives. It was a labour of love for Hill who describes MacLellan as one of Canada's great balladeers. Hill never met the singer/composer, but appreciated his natural singing voice, impressive guitar style, and above all, his unique, evocative compositions.

The CD contains 21 tracks with notes indicating where and when they were recorded. Some, like Continental Blues, are from live CBC Radio shows. Others like Thorn In My Shoe were located at Nashville's Little Victor, where Elvis also recorded. The rare bilingual version of Snowbird is from MacLellan's TV debut on Don Messer's Jubilee. Death of The Black Donnellys was an acoustic demo recording made at CBC studios in Halifax.

Gene MacLellan was born in Val d'Or, Quebec in 1938 and grew up listening to gospel and country music. The 60s found him in Toronto, a member of the band Little Caesar and the Consuls. By this time, MacLellan was also writing songs in a folk/country vein.

MacLellan's road to the top was a winding one. He moved to Pownall, Prince Edward Island in 1964 and worked as an orderly in a psychiatric hospital while continuing to write. His big break finally came when he made an uncharacteristically brash bid to get the attention of Don Messer, barging into Messer's home with bass player Blair Doucette to play a quick song. The ploy worked; Messer put them on Don Messer's Jubilee, which featured a young singer named Anne Murray. MacLellan penned his most famous song with Murray in mind. Snowbird, which took him 20 minutes to write, became a massive international hit, launched Murray's career, and has also been covered by more than 100 other artists including Elvis Presley, Chet Atkins and Englebert Humperdinck. Another big hit for MacLellan was Put Your Hand in the Hand, a cheerful gospel tune which was recorded by Ocean in the 60s and climbed the pop charts.

MacLellan, usually described as self-effacing and shy by those who knew him, was uneasy with success and periodically disappeared from public view. (His facial disfigurement, the result of childhood polio and a car accident made him uncomfortable in the spotlight.) Eventually, he gave away his money, moved to Europe and later became involved in fundamentalist Christianity and prison ministries.

Towards the end of his life, MacLellan returned to songwriting, and made a video for Corrections Canada. But the depression that dogged him through life eventually got the better of him, and he ended his life in January 1995.

EMI is launching its new Northern Heritage label with the MacLellan release, an excellent inaugural choice and an important piece of Canadian musical history.