Steel Rail: at the crossroads of folk, country and bluegrass

Note: For reviews of Steel Rail's three releases, check out our Recordings page.

Steel Rail is (from left to right) Tod Gorr, Ellen Shizgal and Dave Clarke. 

     Click on a band member for a quick bio!

"A national treasure."

That's how one veteran Canadian music critic described the striking original material and fresh acoustic sound of Steel Rail.

The trio's strong songwriting and blend of folk, bluegrass and country took the group to the top of the CBC Galaxie radio folk-roots charts in 2006. And River Song, the latest album by lead singer Tod Gorr, bass player Ellen Shizgal and guitarist Dave Clarke, has received rave reviews in such esteemed folk magazines as Dirty Linen, Sing Out! and Penguin Eggs.

"They find fresh ways to express universal truths," Dirty Linen said.

"Tying together Steel Rail's evocative songs of love, long-vanished youth and the ceaseless turn of the seasons are cordial three-part harmonies and clean, bright arrangements," Patrick Langston of the Ottawa Citizen wrote.

"One is immediately drawn to the beauty of the lyrics and to the sense of the land that permeates the record," wrote David McPherson in Penguin Eggs.

That sense of the land flows from Steel Rail's deep roots in four Canadian provinces. Tod Gorr grew up near Kingston, Ont., and now lives in the Laurentians north of Montreal. Ellen Shizgal was born and bred in Montreal. Dave Clarke spent most of his life in Montreal but now calls Vancouver Island home. And Lucinda Chodan, the band's unofficial fourth member and most prolific lyricist, is an Alberta native who recently drifted west to Victoria. The result: material that ranges from the wide-open Prairies to deep in the Ottawa Valley and further east to the North Shore of the St. Lawrence River.

It didn't start out that way. The trio were all based in or around Montreal when they came together to play country and bluegrass classics in 1991. "We specialized in Bill Monroe and Hank Williams," Dave says. Soon, however, its members began writing original songs in the folk-country vein, winning comparisons to such legendary Canadian songwriters as Gordon Lightfoot and Ian Tyson. Since then, Steel Rail’s material has been covered by artists like Bill Garrett and Sue Lothrop, Tammy Fassaert and Notre Dame de Grass. 

The group has also been acclaimed for its lush harmonies, Dave's stellar picking -- he's been hailed as one of Canada's best acoustic guitarists -- and a sound that gets its sensibility from folk and its soul from bluegrass and old-style country.

 "If you were to fuse early Gordon Lightfoot onto current Del McCoury or the Seldom Scene, something very like Steel Rail would emerge," critic John McLaughlin of the Vancouver Province wrote.

Steel Rail has opened for such bluegrass legends as the late Bill Monroe and the Seldom Scene and appeared in  folk festivals like the Festival by the Sea in Saint John, N.B., Mariposa Folk Festival in Orillia, Ont., the Festival of Friends in Hamilton, the Ottawa Folk Festival and Octoberfolk in Brantford, Ont. The band has also garnered national exposure on CBC radio and been featured in concert on Stuart McLean's Vinyl Café.

Steel Rail has released three albums: River Song (2005), The Road Less Travelled (2000) and A Thousand Miles of Snow (1995). The Road Less Travelled was a finalist in the Country-Roots category of the 2000 Crossroads Music Awards in the U.S., and spent time at the top of the CBC-Galaxie folk-roots radio charts in Canada. The band's debut album, A Thousand Miles of Snow, also garnered critical praise in Canada and the U.S. and airplay on country, campus, community and public broadcasting stations across Canada.

Given geography, the band is now touring in concentrated bursts, with the next foray planned for central Canada in March 2007. Members are also exploring solo projects, with Dave working on his second solo album, slated for release in early spring 2007. Tod performs with the Carleton Place, Ont.-based Thunder Road. And Ellen collaborates with a group of female singers in Montreal. 

The band's new year's resolution for 2007? Not to wait another five years to release a fourth album.

"Five years is too long between releases from this Montreal-based folk/bluegrass/country trio, but patience has its rewards," said critic Patrick Langston. 

For reviews of Steel Rail releases, check out our Recordings page.

Contact Steel Rail

Telephone: 250-598-4968

Address: 1508 Gladstone Ave., Victoria, B.C.

E-Mail:  info@steelrail.ca