Crowe Susan

Artist Information

Biography

Susan Crowe
bio
Often described as a “writer’s writer”, Susan Crowe is one of Canada’s most respected singer songwriters in the folk genre, a label that barely scratches the surface of her compelling and polished approach to music. At once complex, challenging and accessible, Susan’s intelligent and moving songs have captivated audiences and reviewers from coast to coast, continent to continent. She possesses, in the words of Britain’s Folk Roots magazine, “that rare ability of crafting a lyric that bears scrutiny on its own terms.” That rare ability has earned her two Juno nominations, and nominations from both the West Coast and East Coast Music Awards.

In 1994, after being away from music for more than a decade, Susan returned to writing. That led to her first album, This Far From Home, which was chosen by Vancouver’s Georgia Straight as one of the top albums of the year. It was subsequently nominated for a Juno award in the Roots/ Traditional category. Now established as a recording artist of note, Susan returned to the festival circuit and recorded a second album in 1996, The Door to the River, receiving more high praise from critics. Dirty Linen magazine described the two albums as “lyrically sparse but telling, conveying a deep sense of emotion, very subtly but very powerfully…both are rewarding works, both strangely compelling in ways that will move you.”

Susan’s growing reputation as a recording and performing artist was further solidified in 1999 with the release of her third album, .A Pilgrim’s Mirror, which received more plaudits from the critics and a West Coast Music Award nomination.

In October 2003, Susan released her fourth CD titled Book of Days (Corvus/Festival). Produced by Danny Greenspoon at Toronto’s Canterbury Sound studios, Book of Days met with rave reviews across Canada and garnered her nominations from the East Coast Music Awards and the 2004 Juno Awards, for Best Roots/Traditional Solo Recording. It also won her Music Nova Scotia’s award for Best Female Artist.

Her recent CD Greytown (Corvus 2009), also produced by Danny Greenspoon, features 10 original songs, all crafted with the elegance and substance that has become the hallmark of Susan’s work. Greytown earned her the English Songwriter of the Year award at the 2009 Canadian Folk Music Awards ceremony.

The Georgia Straight described Susan’s work as offering “a sense that the singer has tapped into the collective unconscious in a way that what she is singing about is not only true for her but true for all of us.”
Adds the Vancouver Sun: “With one of the most distinctive voices in Canada today, she is destined to become one of our lasting folk heroines.”

Susan was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, lived for many years in Toronto and Vancouver, respectively, and again lives in Halifax.

Instrumentation

Susan Crowe - lyrics and guitar

Discography

This Far From Home
Door to the River
A Pilgrim's Mirror
Book of Days
Greytown

Audio

• Where the Redwood Grows
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• If you were to leave
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• Never Lonesome
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• Boy on a Bicycle
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• The Human Heart
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• Greytown
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• Like Water
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• Made of Gold
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• Stain Upon Her Wing
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• Love's Pure Gold
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• Fell Back Up
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Lyrics

• Boy on a Bicycle
• If you were to leave
• Where the Redwood Grows
• Never Lonesome
• The Human Heart
• Like Water
• Made of Gold
• Greytown
• Stain Upon Her Wing

Video

Photo Gallery

Press

• quotes [+ Show ]
  

  Susan Crowe “Crowe’s hushed and throaty voice will wash over you, until one day you realize her ...Susan Crowe
  
  “Crowe’s hushed and throaty voice will
  wash over you, until one day you realize her
  songs have seeped under your skin. It’ll
  happen as easy as breathing.”
  Montreal Gazette
  
  “Her voice is almost a whisper at times, her
  lyrics sparse but telling, conveying a deep
  sense of emotion, very subtly but very
  powerfully...strangely compelling in ways
  that will touch you”
  Dirty Linen
  
  “…she possesses that rare ability of crafting
  a lyric that bears scrutiny on its own terms.”
  Folk Roots
  

• Crowe has firmly established herself as one of the leading mature voices in the Canadian folk landscape. [+ Show ]
  

  Sandy MacDonald, Halifax Daily Sandy MacDonald, Halifax Daily News, 2004 Mention a Halifax–born s...Sandy MacDonald, Halifax Daily
  Sandy MacDonald, Halifax
  Daily News, 2004
  Mention a Halifax–born singer who
  departed in frustration to establish a
  critically acclaimed music career in
  Vancouver, and most would naturally think
  of Sarah McLachlan.
  Think again; think Susan Crowe, a
  Juno-nominated singer songwriter who
  recently released her fourth album Book Of
  Days. The elegant acoustic album showcases
  Crowe’s insightful writing, beautiful singing
  and impeccable production.
  Like many of her songs, Crowe’s own story
  is one of early promise, frustration, parting
  and finally reconciliation. Crowe was raised
  in rural Cow Bay, laying along the eastern
  headlands of the entrance to Halifax
  Harbour. Growing up in a musical family,
  Crowe took early to playing guitar and
  writing songs. Through the late 70s she was
  a regular in the coffee houses and folk clubs
  in Halifax.
  But by 1980, frustrated with the stagnant
  music scene here, Crowe uprooted and
  moved to Toronto for eight years, then
  moved further west to Vancouver. She
  abandoned her music career, working
  instead as a waitress, art gallery assistant,
  mail carrier and even a beekeeper.
  Then in 1994, Crowe was encouraged by a
  visiting friend to revisit her music, and she
  found the spark that had long been missing.
  She re-embraced her music, and went into a
  studio in Vancouver to record This Far from
  Home, which garnered a Juno nomination as
  Best Roots/ Traditional Album of the year.
  Crowe released two more critically
  acclaimed discs in the 90s – The Door To The
  River and A Pilgrim’s Mirror – both on her
  own Corvus imprint. Two years ago, Crowe
  returned to Nova Scotia, established a home
  in Halifax and has played a handful of
  shows in metro.
  With the release of this substantial new disc,
  Crowe has firmly established herself as one
  of the leading mature voices in the Canadian
  folk landscape. Pegging her music to a
  narrow definition, though, does it a
  disservice. Crowe breathes in light jazz,
  contemporary folk, show tunes, acoustic
  pop and trad country, then breathes out her
  own richly distilled sound.
  Her voice has a lush worldly authority that
  convincingly delivers her carefully crafted
  lyrics. Crowe brought aboard producer
  Danny Greenspoon (Great Big Sea,
  Quartette, Jane Bunnett) to pilot the album,
  and his understated production lets Crowe’s
  songs blossom on the vine.
  Crowe opens the disc with the haunting
  ‘Dreamless’, a stark tale of loneliness set in a
  frozen landscape, where “the north wind
  replies to each breath that I take.” Pushed along
  by John Reischman’s mandolin, the
  understated guitar of Kevin Breit and the
  locked in rhythm section of bassist George
  Koller and drummer Mark Mariash, the
  tune is hypnotic in its urgency.
  Crowe can also deliver the pretty folk
  melody (‘Fell Back Up’), the Appalachian
  influenced ‘Whippoorwill’, and the delicate
  piano /vocal gem, ‘Do You Think On Me Still
  Kindly’, with the McGarrigle sisters-inspired
  harmonies. (Crowe enlisted Gwen Swick,
  Cindy Church and Liz Soderberg to sing
  harmony parts.)
  This is subtle intelligent music that draws in
  the listener with its alluring complexity and
  keeps you listening for its rainy-afternoon
  beauty.
  

Setlist

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