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"I've had chances to go see Lightfoot, and I missed out," sighs Cormier on the phone from Toronto. "Then I had tickets to see him in Halifax, and he got sick. So I was cheated once again.

"I have seen him from the wings, while he was on stage, but that's not the same thing. When I met him for the first time, we were playing the Ottawa Folk Festival, and I got to stand on the side of the stage and watch him work, all by himself, and he sang If You Could Read My Mind and was brilliant, but it just wasn't the same as being in the crowd and seeing him with his band.

"Some of his musicians have been with him for 30 years, and they're just so incredibly tight. The groove is incredible. I just want to be able to sit there in the front row and watch them for 90 minutes. That's what I'd really like to do."

Even though Cormier has named off lots of key influences over the years - Chet Atkins for guitar, his uncle Joe Cormier for fiddling, any number of bluegrass legends for mandolin and guitar - for him Lightfoot is the wellspring. >> more