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A song for Canada’s 150th Birthday

Local musicians Laurie Thain and Gordon Maxwell have written a song about what it means to be Canadian.

A Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian.

That’s how local musicians Laurie Thain and Gordon Maxwell feel.

And just in time for Canada’s 150th birthday the duo have released a song uniting Canadians called I Am Canadian.

The song came about in 2015 following the federal election.

Thain and Maxwell felt there was a lot of heated and divisive talk centred around what it meant to be a Canadian.

They felt some politicians were making a differentiation between “Old-stock Canadians and New-stock Canadians”.

At the time the pair were working in the studio on an ESL song for a client.

The song was going to be for children to practice their English but to also talk about their own nationality.

While writing it Thain and Maxwell started talking about being Canadian and what that elusive quality is that the world recognizes as the Canadian persona.

“Gordon and I have deep roots in Canada,” said Thain.

“We realized that some people are just beginning their lives in Canada and they are Canadian too. And we didn’t want to write a song that would make them feel that they weren’t as valuable as we were just because we’ld been here longer,” she said.

The song is based in country music.

“But it’s more of a Canadiana offering because it’s got the sweetness of a pop song tune,” said Thain.

The song is sung in two different verses.

The first verse is sung by Maxwell and it is about people who have deep roots in the country. The next verse is sung by Thain and it is for people who don’t have deep roots, “but are willing to make their contribution”.

Thain’s favourite part of the song is the chorus.

It says, “We come from different places, we all have different names, we all have different faces but we are all the same.”

The song speaks a truth says Thain.

“Because it includes everybody and there is nothing you can say to deny that,” said Thain.

Thain hopes every Canadian will have a chance to hear their song.

To share their pride respect and emotional attachment to the country we call home.



Colleen Flanagan

About the Author: Colleen Flanagan

I got my start with Black Press Media in 2003 as a photojournalist.
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