Legendary Canadian musician passed away

The world says farewell to Gordon Lightfoot, a prominent twentieth-century folk and rock musician.

With this publication, we begin a series about Canadian culture.

In the mid-1950s, and later in the 1960s and 1970s, folk music captured the minds of civil rights activists, housewives, and teenagers, with hits by Bob Dylan and Joan Baez blasting from every iron. Gordon Lightfoot was one of the leaders of the folk movement being, probably, the most sophisticated poet of the twentieth century in the Canadian song tradition. He passed away this Monday, May 1, at the age of 84.

Born in the small town of Orillia, Ontario, Gordon Lightfoot has done more for his country music than probably any other Canadian musician of the past century. His equal, Leonard Cohen, left this world in 2016. Now Canada's songwriting legacy rests in the centuries and on vinyl records, sounding from smartphone screens and home speakers.

Without perhaps knowing his name, we are nevertheless familiar with his work and, most importantly, his voice is easily recognized. An aristocratic baritone, he could have been a successful artist in any other genre, but he chose the guitar as a companion to his musical passions.