Local musician Ryan Snow, a Harbour Grace native now living in South River, is no stranger around a tune. A longtime member of Sheila’s Brush, Snow has branched out solo with his latest effort Tales from the Lighthouse.

Produced and engineered by Brad Tuck with collaborators Ryan Baker and Ray Legere, Snow’s collection is a proper taste of home perfectly paired with come home year festivities.

We caught up with Snow for an in depth look into the new record for the latest in our album deep dive series.

Sea Legs

This was the first song written for the album. This song was written about an excursion I had with my wife and friends out by Harbour Grace Island trying for some elusive codfish. My friend took us out jigging and the wind picked up after I was whistling. He blamed the wind on my whistling. Nonetheless, the water got choppy and I got feeling a little sick. I had to get brought ashore and then home to lie down. Having ‘Sea Legs’ is a rite of passage for most Newfoundlanders and Labradorean’s, I just didn’t get them. I did finish the song with a better ending than I had, as he became quite proud of the ones that he had grown (unlike myself). 

Tales from the Lighthouse

Modern technology in marine travel is becoming more advanced by the day. The use of lighthouses over the course of time have saved many distressed travelers and fisherman alike. 

This song uses the words “The lighthouse keepers eye’s upon us” referring to the actual light from the lighthouse as a metaphor for the lighthouse keepers watchful eyes.

Audrey’s Adventure

This song came about in a funny way. I was writing music one morning and my little girl, who was six at the time, asked how come I haven’t written a song about her? I told her to grab a scribbler and write down some things she would like to have in her song. 

So in her six-year-old fashion, she had fictional characters like witches and wizards and trolls and dragons, like you would. We created an adventure where she went off in a hot air balloon to see all kinds of magical places to end up finding some unicorns in the sky.

The Storyteller

We all have people in our lives that can captivate us in their stories and keep us hanging on for more. This was inspired by my good friend Jim Pike who’s never stuck for words and my father Wendell Snow who always has a great story to tell. I wrote the song in a type of executive summary style format where two stories are introduced (“Of broken hearts and shattered sails”) and the following verses in the song elaborate on their stories.

Music that Makes Us

This is a tribute to all the great music that has shaped so many of us. I can remember being a kid and my dad would have Irish/Newfoundland music always playing in the kitchen. It has shaped the music I play and the music I love – and now the music I make. The song has a start similar to Simani’s intro in Outport People and takes a turn of its own. In this song there are 29 song references to well-known Irish/Newfoundland folk songs. Some songs are easy to pick out while some others are more difficult. See how many you can able to identify!

Jigs in Full Sail

A great representation of the accordion skills of Ryan Baker. Ryan is from Marystown and has played with the likes of The Ennis Sisters, Natalie MacMaster, and even at Casino Nova Scotia where he performed a tribute to Harry Hibbs. His playing ability is one of the best I’ve ever seen. You can even hear the banjo skills of Brad Tuck following along. Brad’s presence is all over the album with various instruments and vocal harmonies. Brad is a professional multi-instrumentalist and a well-known singer and songwriter. I was fortunate to get introduced to both of these guys and will be forever grateful for their contribution to the album.

Dawn

I had to finish off the album with a sad song I wrote for my aunt that has passed. She was my godmother. She had a lengthy battle with cancer and had it defeated many times. Ultimately, she couldn’t take anymore and succumbed to it. I was asked to play a song at her funeral, but I couldn’t think of a song that would fit, so I wrote this one that evening instead. The day after I had it finished and was prepared to play it, I was informed that I was not allowed to play it in the Catholic Church as it was against their rules. I did play it in the funeral home at her wake and haven’t played it live since then.

“We know what we’re fighting for, home, boys home!”

So echoes a classic Shanneyganock cut on the ties of place and the forever-pull of the tether to home-sweet-home. It’s ironic and ever-so-fitting that the group that bleeds pink, white and green, the b’ys in the band Shanneyganock, would cap off the 2022 Iceberg Alley Performance Tent concert series, headlining the much anticipated Come Home Year celebrations among a who’s who of our province’s finest.

Yes, it’s fixing to be a come-home of epic proportions, and shaggy and soulful frontman Chris Andrews is more than up to the task. 

“It’s a great lineup of bands and lots of friends too,” Andrews shared in a sitdown with The Herald. “Ticket sales we hear are really, really good. So it’s going to be a big night, I think, for everybody. A celebration of our province.”

Come Home Year

A treasured flag-bearer of our province’s tried-and-true trad sound, Shanneyganock have been there and done it all in nearly three decades in the business, with the Come Home Year night headline slot alongside NL staples The Ennis Sisters, The Irish Descendants, The Celtic Connection, The Navigators and Carolina East yet another in a long line of honours for the rowdy and rearin’ crew.

“We’re looking forward to headlining ourselves this time,” Andrews shared proudly. “We got some legendary Newfoundland acts like The Ennis Sisters, Celtic Connection, Irish Descendants, Carolina East and The Navigators. It’s fantastic with all those artists coming in, but I can’t lie, it’s great to see the Newfoundland night always sell out. The original Irish Descendants last year, the Alan Doyle show, people are coming out and supporting the performers from here. And I think that’s fantastic.”

Songs sung & gigs of old

Reminiscing on songs sung and gigs of old, Andrews laughed at the realization that the bands’ 2002 record Scallywags, celebrates a 20th anniversary this year, remarking with his trademarked laugh, “We were scallywags. At that time we were a bunch of scallywags. We were what you thought of a touring trad band, having a time, spreading music, loving the music. I think the only difference now is that we’re probably not scallywags anymore. Take the partying side of being on stage out of it and you got still the same dudes who love music and love having a good time and love making the audience enjoy themselves.”

Rain Drizzle & Fog

Of course classic discography milestones aren’t the only cause to celebrate this year, as the band recently uncorked their latest party-ready single, Rain Drizzle & Fog, written by newly minted bandmember Patrick Moran. 

“Rain, drizzle and fog is all that I hear, I think I’ll stay in the shed and go right on the beer,” Andrews recites with a laugh.

“It was a song written by Patrick Moran, the one and only. Patrick is playing with us full time now. The band keeps growing with Ian and Brad and Craig has moved back to the province and he’s playing shows with us, so we’re a six piece now. So it’s great because we get the influences from the different people in the band. 

“Patrick came to me and said ‘b’y I wrote this song, it was in my mind.’ And as soon as I heard it I was like yep! That will work perfectly.’ So we recorded it up at Tuck’s studio and we just shot a video now with The Outhouse guys and Karl Wells. Karl does a cameo with us and of course he’s mentioned in the song, being one of our most famous weather folks. It’s a catchy song, and it just hits at things that we all sorta know, being from here in Newfoundland. The weather is a part of us whether we want it to be or not.”

‘Still nervous’

Andrews, Mark Hiscock, Ian Chipman, Craig Young, Brad Tuck and Patrick Moran continue to pack houses from one corner of the island to the other and beyond. You’d think, after 25 years and counting, that Andrews and co. would be long rid of the pre-show jitters.

“Still nervous. Every show you’re only as good as your last show, right? So every time you’ve got to give ‘er, give ‘er, give ‘er, and we pride ourselves on that,” Andrews remarked honestly. 

“We work hard. We take it very seriously. Even though we’re having fun, we take it very seriously. Because people are paying a lot of money for this. It’s not like they’re coming in and getting it for nothing or anything. So people are going to spend their hard earned dollars on us. We’re going to give ‘em everything we got.”

Newfoundlandia staple

Perhaps serving as the unofficial ambassadors of Newfoundland and Labrador’s own Come Home Year in 2022, Shanneyganock’s status as a symbolic staple of Newfoundlandia remains unquestioned. Home, boys, home indeed!

“I’m looking forward to people being able to get back to being what we’re known for,” Andrews says warmly. 

“Internationally, Newfoundlanders and Labradorians are known as good people, fun people, love their culture, love to accept people in, to enjoy things with them and are open to other people’s cultures and just for everybody to get together this year and have fun. That’s what I’m looking forward to.”

Follow Shanneyganock on social media for live event dates and much more!

From Shanneyganock and Fairgale to the trappings of a successful solo career, Brad Tuck is one of Newfoundland and Labrador’s most tireless artists.

Whether behind the drum kit or standing center stage, Tuck has earned well deserved clout as a multi-talented musician and entertainer, with his first two solo efforts On These Waters and The Rocky Isle earning critical adoration.

Now Tuck is back once more with his latest collection Stages, sitting down with The Herald for our latest album deep dive series for an in-depth exploration into the songs, stories and meaning behind the music.

Madeline’s Might

Madeline’s Might is the first song I wrote for this album. It was written about two years ago, and recorded shortly thereafter. It tells the story of a reliable, old fishing vessel hailing from Fortune Bay, NL. 

The boat may not be new and shiny, but when push comes to shove its crew knows she’ll always guide them through any storm or trouble at sea. Fishermen are some of the toughest, bravest people on this planet, and they rely on their vessels, big and small, old and new, to guide them home after each trip. 

This was my inspiration for Madeline’s Might, a sturdy longliner that will always see its crew returned home safely to their families. It turned out to be a fun, upbeat song, and I figured it was a great way to start the album.

Irish All Along

This song features a melody I had been working on for quite some time. I could never find suitable lyrics or the right song idea to fit this melody so I sat on it for a couple of years. A good friend of mine, Ryan Snow, recorded a song several years ago with his band, Shiela’s Brush, called Irish All Along. 

We were speaking about that song one day and I began humming those words to the melody I had been banking for a while. That night I started writing lyrics focused on a hardworking Irishman, a jack of all trades, who had relocated to Boston. A young lady finally discovers his secret one evening, that he had indeed been Irish all along. It was a really fun track to record, with a unique instrumentation section in the middle featuring Kitchen Parti’s Terri Lynn Hickey on tin whistle.

Stages

This is the final song I wrote for the album. I had been stuck on nine songs for a while and knew I needed to write one more song to round out the album. My fiancée was seven months pregnant at the time and was off having her baby shower in New Harbour. I wrote this song on my father in law’s guitar as I passed the afternoon away.

The opening line of this song is particularly important to me. A lasting childhood memory for me growing up in Hant’s Harbour is the sight of bed sheets blowing in the wind on my mothers clothesline, which ran from her steps down to a pole in her garden, where two lilac trees bloom each spring. 

My father’s old blue Ford F150 would sit in the driveway next to the steps, and in the breeze the bedsheets would often flail across the hood of the pickup. I don’t know what was so pivotal about that but it always stuck with me, and I’m happy to have that memory included in this song.

The title, Stages, touches on two points. First, there’s the obvious nod to old fishing stages and the role those buildings played in many of our childhoods, mine included. Many life lessons were learned in those old buildings, passed down from one generation to the next. 

Secondly, the title refers to the stages of our lives. From child to parent, from parent to grandparent, and so on. It all happens so fast, and it’s up to each generation to eventually pass the things they learned as children onto their own children. 

So as we all make that transition from student to teacher, “It seems we all wind up back in stages after all.” I thought this message was pretty powerful, and after some thought I decided to name the album Stages as well.

The Red Violin

I had been wanting to write a song about the life-cycle of an old instrument for a while. I decided to focus on a violin and with Remembrance Day approaching in 2020 I tied the violin’s story to that of a veteran. In the lyrics, this violin had been passed from the veteran’s grandfather to his father and then to him, and he played it with pride. After a war injury prevented him from playing any longer the violin sat on a shelf for years, only to eventually get a second chance at life due to a chance meeting.

It’s the first song I’ve written in 3/4 timing and it was a new approach for me. I’m quite happy with how it turned out – perhaps my favourite of all the songs I’ve written thus far.

Battle Harbour Bound

“Just a family man with two keen hands for a waltz around the stove.” My Grandfather, William Pitcher, was a cook by trade. He would travel on The Kyle to Frenchman’s Island and Battle Harbour, a thriving fishing port during those days off the coast of Labrador, to cook for the fishermen there. I thought It’d be a neat idea to write a song about that. 

Most Newfoundland songs revolve around fishing and fishermen, so I thought it’d be a unique angle to write a song about the people who fed the fishermen. Although he had passed away before I was born, my mother and Uncle often speak of my grandfather’s trips to Battle Harbour when they were children. 

Today, Battle Harbour is a raging tourist destination. I’ve been in contact with the Battle Harbour Trust and I hope to visit there next summer to perform.

Tie Me Down

I worked on an album with Jacob Lewis a few years ago, a terrific singer/songwriter from Bay Roberts. 

We became great friends through that process and I was eager to collaborate on a track. One day Jacob played me his version of an old Ryan’s Fancy song that caught my ear. Penned many years ago by Allister MacGillivray, the song was right up Jacob’s alley. I began working on my own arrangement and asked Jacob to sing it with me, and thankfully he was quick to agree. I’m very happy with the end result and I hope to team up with Jacob for a live show sometime soon.

Three Fishers

These lyrics were originally a poem, written by English poet and Priest, Charles Kingsley in 1851. The poem was adapted to music many times through the decades, and I heard a lovely version by Stan Rogers a couple of years ago. I thought the song would be a perfect finishing track to this album. It’s a somber tale of three fishermen who go to sea never to return, and the resulting impact their loss has on the ones left behind. 

It’s a reminder that although we may sing plenty of light-hearted sea shanties, when it comes to earning a living from the sea, there are numerous tales of loss and sadness as well. I was happy to have Gabie Toner-Godbout perform cello, and my good friend, Stephen Green, perform piano on this track.