Scott Cook

Genre: Singer/Songwriter
Secondary Genre: Folk Edmonton, Alberta Canada Contact

Scott Cook is an Edmonton-based, tirelessly traveling songwriter with heart forever on sleeve. Accompanying himself with fingerstyle guitar, banjo and ukulele, or backed by his band The Long Weekends, he brings honesty, years of roads and a deep love of humanity to his songcraft and storytelling.

Artist Information

Biography

If you listen well, lifelong traveler and musical hobo Scott Cook's new album may remind you just how rare a commodity honesty is in today's music scene. There's an awful lot of talk about it, but very few songwriters really wear their hearts on their sleeve, and even fewer do it with such lyrical craftsmanship and raw feeling as you'll hear on this record.

It has been four years and a lot of roads traveled since Scott Cook traded in his job teaching kindergarten in Taiwan for a full-time living as a musician on the road in North America. Between booking, promoting and playing over 150 dates a year, touring back and forth across the continent while living out of his van, he's managed to release three self-produced albums: 2007's Long Way to Wander, 2009's This One's on the House, and his newest "love letter to the world", 2011's Moonlit Rambles. This latest collection of songs shows the prairie balladeer in fine form, deepening his craft and raising the stakes. Three-part harmonies, touches of electric, acoustic and tenor guitars, accordion, fiddle, organ, dobro, and pedal steel colour the arrangements, but at the heart of things is a mellow fingerstyle groove and a plain-spoken clarity that's rarely heard these days.

Scott has toured extensively in North America and Taiwan, including appearances at Taiwan's Spring Scream Festival (8 times) and Peace Festival (4 times), Canada's North Country Fair (7 times), South Country Fair (3 times), Fred Eaglesmith's Southern Picnic (2 times), Pembina River Nights (2 times), Sasquatch Gathering (6 times), Islands Folk Festival, ArtsWells (3 times), Robson Valley Music Festival (3 times), Michigan's Earthworks Harvest Gathering (4 times) and New York's Hoot on the Hudson with Pete Seeger, as well as legendary venues like the Sidetrack Cafe in Edmonton, the Ironwood in Calgary, the Railway Club in Vancouver and the Cameron House in Toronto.

Tunes, tour dates, and hobo travelogue can be found on http://www.scottcook.net.

Folks say:

"Scott Cook has distilled his travels down into songs powered by a sharp eye for imagery, a healthy dose of humanity, and that unforgettable voice, that at the same time intones the rigors of the road and the most comfortable couch you have ever slept on." -David Francey, 3x Juno Winner

"Moonlit Rambles is like a conversational bottle of Jack passed around a dawn fire, everything burning just right." -SEE Magazine, Edmonton

"Edmonton-based songwriter Scott Cook belongs to that fine tradition of traveling minstrels like Woody Guthrie... it's a good solid disc he's produced himself with lots of good players... Cook is definitely a writer to keep an eye on. Strong, decent stuff." -Barry Hammond, Penguin Eggs

"Basically, this is exactly the kind of act you'd be happy to stumble down the hill or through the birches and hear at a music festival... warm like a campfire, familiar like the lake down the road... deep-thinking, introspective stuff" -Fish Griwkowsky, The Edmonton Sun

"His music has the ability to transport one instantly to a space of campfire-lit, creek-dipping radiance. Listening to this album is perennially serendipitous--like one is chancing upon a well-traveled old soul by the fireside, whose stripping-away-the-veneer knowledge of the world is never jaded, but always innocent." -Monica Chattaway, CKUA Radio

Instrumentation

Jesse Dee - Backing Vocals, Lead Guitar
Jacquie B - Backing Vocals, keyboard, Accordion
Moses Gregg - Bass
Matt Blackie - Drums, Backing Vocals

Discography

Scott Cook - Moonlit Rambles, 2011
Scott Cook - This One's on the House, 2009
Scott Cook - Long Way to Wander, 2007
The Anglers - A Quarter Ounce of Prevention, 2003

Links

Audio

Lyrics

Video

Photo Gallery

Press

  • The Edmonton Sun [+ Show ]

    "Basically, this is exactly the kind of act you'd be happy to stumble down the hill or through the b...

  • The Edmonton Journal [+ Show ]

    "Long Way To Wander resonates with a Dylan-esque verve, a Waits-ian post-modernity, Cook baring his ...

  • AnE Vibe, Toronto [+ Show ]

    4 Stars Reviewed By: Kindah Mardam Bey Scott Cook goes to show you what talent and a banjo can...

  • CKUA Radio [+ Show ]

    "His voice is Tom Waits, his sensibilities are Bob Dylan, Kerouac, and Walt Whitman, and his music i...

  • Vue Weekly, Edmonton [+ Show ]

    Even though our winter has been far from menacing this year, there’s no better way to warm up the Ja...

  • Taipei Times, 2008 [+ Show ]

    On a steel horse he rides By Alita Rickards CONTRIBUTING REPORTER Friday, Apr 18, 2008, Page 15 ...

  • SEE Magazine, Edmonton [+ Show ]

    By the time the Anglers took the stage, emotions were already running high. As entranced bodies bobb...

  • Moonlit Rambles CD review [+ Show ]

    A second sating and gushing source of water in the Edmonton landscape comes to us from Scott Cook, w...

Setlist

Original songs and stories, plus lesser-known covers by friends of mine like Corin Raymond, Jonathan Byrd and Geoff Berner, and others I admire like Greg Brown, Bob Dylan, John Prine, and Hank Williams.

Basic Requirements

Calendar

DateTimeVenueCity
May 26, 2012 Saturday 12:00 AM Juan de Fuca Festival Port Angeles, WA, US
Jun 1, 2012 Friday 12:00 AM Solstice Cafe Victoria, BC, CA
Jun 2, 2012 Saturday 12:00 AM Joe's Garage Courtenay, BC, CA
Jun 2, 2012 Saturday 12:00 PM Duncan Garage Showroom Duncan, CA
Jun 5, 2012 Tuesday 12:00 AM Vancouver Rowing Club Vancouver, BC, CA
Jun 6, 2012 Wednesday 12:00 AM Serenity Music Festival Clearwater, BC, CA
Jun 7, 2012 Thursday 12:00 AM The Whistle Stop Pub Jasper, AB, CA
Jun 8, 2012 Friday 12:00 AM OPEN SKY FESTIVAL Edmonton, AB, CA
Jun 14, 2012 Thursday 12:00 AM House Concert Edson, AB, CA
Jun 18, 2012 Monday 12:00 AM Devaney's Irish Pub Edmonton, AB, CA
Jun 22, 2012 Friday 12:00 AM The North Country Fair Driftpile, AB, CA
Jun 28, 2012 Thursday 12:00 AM House concert Swift Current, SK, CA
Jun 29, 2012 Friday 12:00 AM Freedom Fest Moose Jaw, SK, CA
Jul 4, 2012 Wednesday 12:00 AM Rock Island Lodge Wawa, ON, CA
Jul 6, 2012 Friday 12:00 AM Cicada Fest Port Dalhousie, ON, CA
Jul 12, 2012 Thursday 6:00 PM The Cameron House , ON, CA
Jul 16, 2012 Monday 12:00 AM Little Beaver Cultural Center Fort Frances, ON, CA
Jul 17, 2012 Tuesday 12:00 AM Pop Soda's Coffeehouse & Gallery Winnipeg, MB, CA
Jul 18, 2012 Wednesday 12:00 AM Kergano's Moose Jaw, SK, CA
Jul 22, 2012 Sunday 12:00 AM South Country Fair Fort Mcleod, AB, CA
Jul 27, 2012 Friday 12:00 AM Sasquatch Gathering Evansburg, AB, CA
Jul 30, 2012 Monday 12:00 AM Streetfest Revelstoke, BC, CA
Aug 1, 2012 Wednesday 12:00 AM House Concert Yalakom Valley, BC, CA
Aug 2, 2012 Thursday 12:00 AM House concert Lytton, BC, CA
Aug 3, 2012 Friday 12:00 AM ArtsWells Festival of All Things Art Wells, BC, CA
Aug 7, 2012 Tuesday 12:00 AM Nancy O's Prince George, BC, CA
Aug 15, 2012 Wednesday 12:00 AM Live and Upfront concert series Saskatoon, SK, CA
Aug 18, 2012 Saturday 12:00 AM Come By the Hills Folk Music Festival Wainwright, AB, CA
Aug 18, 2012 Saturday 12:00 AM Spaghetti Western Festival Calgary, AB, CA
Aug 18, 2012 Saturday 3:00 PM Central Music Festival Red Deer, AB, CA
Aug 19, 2012 Sunday 12:00 AM Gallery House Concerts Calgary, AB, CA
Aug 24, 2012 Friday 12:00 AM Friday Folk Bloomington, IN, US
Aug 26, 2012 Sunday 12:00 AM Pump House Concerts East Lansing, MI, US
Sep 1, 2012 Saturday 12:00 AM Thumbfest Lexington, MI, US
Sep 7, 2012 Friday 12:00 AM Crazy Wisdom Bookstore & Tearoom Ann Arbor, MI, US
Sep 10, 2012 Monday 12:00 AM Moonshine Cafe Oakville, ON, CA
Oct 11, 2012 Thursday 12:00 AM House concert Guelph, ON, CA
Oct 23, 2012 Tuesday 12:00 AM O'Reilly's Pub Perth Perth, ON, CA
Nov 2, 2012 Friday 8:00 PM Union Street Cafe Berwick, NS, CA
Nov 23, 2012 Friday 12:00 AM Two Way Street Coffee House Downers Grove, IL, US
Feb 16, 2013 Saturday 12:00 AM Northern Lights Folk Club Edmonton, AB, CA