Here's Bill's bio
[- if you're looking to extract a little thumbnail as a backgrounder to
the lyrics...i.e. "who is this guy?"]
As a kid, Bill Usher grew up listening to Tin Pan Alley standards,
Be-bop and three-chord rhythm & blues. He learned to play the clarinet
in
high school - good enough to solo at Toronto's venerable Massey Hall.
Along came poets like Dylan and Ochs with their rhyme and reason and the
world changed for the young man. He taught himself hand drums and later
the drum set so that he could sit in with the 'singer /song writers' who
sang out throughout the seventies: People like Valdy, Willie P. Bennett,
Stan Rogers, Shirley Eikhard, Fraser & DeBolt and Bruce Cockburn,
with whom Bill later toured and recorded.
For about a dozen years, the recording studio was Usher's second
home and today the count sits at over 100 albums played on for the cream
of
Canadian musical society. There's also another 60 albums that he has
produced - earning three Juno Awards and Gold and Platinum records along
the way - for artists as diverse as Sharon, Lois & Bram, New York's
(neo-punk) Horse Flies and Big Bird & Oscar the Grouch. One of Bill's
Junos was for his children's album DRUMS!, that then led to the family
concert Son Of A Drum! Both have been performed hundreds of times in
community halls and schools across Canada.
But, always inside this musician's mind was the writer, the curious
one. At night Usher played on the world's stages, while during the day,
microphone in hand, he interviewed a who's who of musical history during
four years of hosting and producing more than five dozen documentaries for
Peter Gzowski's and Sylvia Tyson's radio shows on the CBC. Another writing
outlet included a book of stories edited from the halcyon days of the Mariposa
Folk Festival. Bill was also the creator and co-producer, with Atlantis
Films,
of TROUPERS, a 26 part children's variety show, shown locally on Global
Television and around the world.
Just returned from a three week tour of the Yukon and British
Columbia, Bill recorded a video showcase of the last concert of the tour
given at Bloor Street United Church in Toronto on, fittingly, International
Women's Day. Intended as an opportunity for new audiences to discover
Bill's talents, a copy of the video showcase can be obtained by contacting
Bam Boom productions at <bamboom@interlog.com>.
Bill Usher 100 Bain Ave., 19 the Aberdeens, Toronto Canada M4K 1E8
(416) 465-1335 bamboom@interlog.com