Malcolm Gladwell recorded a podcast about creativity, contrasting artists who revise and refine with artists who appear to produce their work whole.  It was Episode 7 in his Revisionist History series, published July 27, 2016. He illustrated his big idea with references to Elvis Costello’s revisions to The Deportee’s Club and the development of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah by Cohen, by John Cale, by Jeff Buckley before it became a pop standard and a secular hymn.

Gladwell mentioned the fact that the song was an obscure song from 1984 until 2001, and the variations introduced by Cale and Buckley, but passed over the uses of the Buckley cover on MTV and in television, the use of the Cale cover in the movie Shrek, the Rufus Wainright cover (for the Shrek soundtrack recording), the k.d. Lang cover and her 2010 Winter Olympic Concert, and the singing contest show television performances on The Voice and X Factor. The information is on Wikipedia in the entry Hallelujah (Leonard Cohen song).

Gladwell cites his sources on the Episode Web page, usually including books available from one of his sponsors.

One of his sources was Alan Light’s 2012 book The Holy or the Broken: Leonard Cohen, Jeff Buckley, and the Unlikely Ascent of “Hallelujah”, which is also the a principal source for the Wikipedia entry. As the title implies, Light explores the tension between the religious exclamation and the biblical allusions, and the vivid, graphic memories of love experienced in sex acts.  Light comes close to saying that Cohen followed the Quebecois pattern of using the name of sacred objects as  obscenities.

Addendum: if you can get through the paywall, David Remnick’s October 2016 biographical article in the New Yorker on Cohen at 82 is worthwhile

I camped at the Islands Folk Festival in Duncan BC. It was my first visit to this festival.

The festival is held at Providence Farm, a former convent of the Sisters of St. Ann, once a boarding school, now an organic farm. It accomodates a crowd of a about 2,000 (sometimes vaguely stated as a few thousand) comfortably. Site Map. There is trailer camping in the “Upper Field”, and tent camping on a treed hill – no parking spots or access roads.  There are a few wheelbarrows available for tent campers to move gear from the vehicle-accessible areas into the camp.  The tent area has shade and some shelter from the wind.

The main stage concert on Friday July 22 was opened by Matthew and Jill Barber, who performed songs from their new album.  They have a few original songs, but the album’s theme is songs that they have known and admired.  They did a cover of Ian Tyson’s Summer Wages, introduced with a story about summer jobs planting trees.  They shifted the emphasis away from the possessive angst of “… never leave your woman alone when your friends are out to steal her” to the reflective:

“… The dreams of the seasons are all spilled down on the floor”

“So I’ll work on them towboats in my slippery city shoes
Which I swore I would never do again
Through the grey fogbound straits where the cedars stand waiting
I’ll be far off and gone like summer wages”

They covered The Song of the French Partisan, citing Leonard Cohen as their main influence, joining Cohen, Buffy St. Marie and other artists.  Ironically, Joan Baez, already an apostle of non-violent resistance, covered this song of armed resistance in her 1972 album Come From the Shadows. They also cover Neil Young’s Comes a Time, referring to the time their parents lived in Winnipeg.

Oysterband played a double slot – nearly two hours.  They performed, as they do in other concert performances, songs from a vast repertoire, written and polished in a 4o year career.  I don’t miss a chance to see them when they come to BC. They have change their performing company.  John Jones, Alan Prosser and Ian Telfer are still performing.  Veterans Lee Partis and Ray Cooper (Chopper) left in 2007 and 2012 respectively.

I was impressed by the arrangements and ensemble work of Jayme Stone’s Lomax Project, at their concert in the daytime Spirit Stage venue. The busy and versatile Moira Smiley was with Jayme Stone and the project for this festival.