>>PREVIEW
SARAH HARMER
Friday, April 7
Saturday, April 8
Knox United Church
Sarah Harmer is well-known for her ethereal voice and tender lyrics, and it would be easy to think of her as a dreamy-eyed chanteuse seeing the world through rose-coloured glasses. But the dreamer is grounded in the most pragmatic reality.
Harmer has spent the last year or so splitting her time between her new album and her efforts to stop a plan to turn the escarpment into a gravel pit near her family farm – an untouched wildlife area in rural Ontario that borders on Harmer’s family land. Perhaps not by coincidence, the new album, I’m a Mountain, is full of nature imagery. You’d be justified in thinking the theme was deliberate – but not so, apparently.
"These songs accumulated over a number of years," says Harmer. "And yet they did all seem connected to me as well. I grew up on a farm, and one of the things that’s readily apparent is that we’re all nature, we’re all embedded in nature."
The album was recorded in a whopping four days. "It was a super-concentrated process, very high energy," admits Harmer. You can’t delay the big decisions – you have to make a decision and keep moving.
"I have lots of days where I don’t feel like I do that much, so it was good to be so productive in such a short period of time. We recorded almost the entire thing live off the floor.
"It was sort of the opposite of the process for the last album. Sometimes the first thought you have is the best thought – somebody famous said that, I think," she notes. "I recorded that one at home, at my leisure, and having all the time in the world maybe dulls your energy a bit."
Harmer’s efforts on I’m a Mountain weren’t the only exciting things to happen to her in the past year. Between the satisfaction of solo producing the album, the birth of a nephew who has managed to rally after a shaky start in the world, and her involvement in the petition to save the escarpment from development, Harmer’s life has been full of learning powerful life lessons.
For the past year, she’s been driven by the discovery that LaFarge has submitted a plan to the government to develop a gravel quarry in the escarpment. Harmer has been helping to prepare the case for protecting the land from development, and touring to support those efforts.
"My favourite place is being outside, so it was wonderful that I spent most of 2005 off the road, except for the ‘I Love the Escarpment Tour,’ which was kind of a hiking tour throughout the area," says Harmer.
The effort to save the escarpment is going well, a fact Harmer is very proud of.
"We’ve found a threatened species of salamander, the Jefferson salamander, there," she says proudly. "It’s not in the best interests of the company to find the true ecological impact on the area, so it’s important that we speak up.
"I’m so grateful for how much I’ve learned this year – we started a local citizens’ group and have met so many of our neighbours as a result. My heart is so much in this," she adds.
"I ran into Bruce Cockburn on the street not long ago and we started talking about the petition, and he said to me, ‘enjoy what you’re doing now. The outcome is never known and there are sometimes disappointments, so find value in the process.’
"Not that I’m expecting disappointment," she concludes optimistically. |
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