CD Reviews

Sky With Nothing To Get In The Way - Connie Kaldor (Coyote Entertainment Group)

Sky With Nothing To Get In The Way is a strong collection of new songs from Regina-born Connie Kaldor, a Juno Award-winning veteran of the Canadian and international folk scenes.

Kaldor, 52, wrote all of the songs on the CD except for the title tune, which she co-wrote with her producer and husband Paul Campagne. She possesses a strong, clear and versatile voice that is a perfect vehicle for her highly personal and moving songs of love, loss, exhilaration and despair.

Highlights of the CD, which features predominantly stark, yet tasteful, arrangements dominated by acoustic guitar that are a perfect complement to those songs and to her voice, include the opening track, Pieces of Your Heart, a nicely structured broken heart story; Small Town Saturday Night, a funny and insightful slice of rural Canadian life; Sweet Old Heartache, a defiant defence of misguided love; Never Run Out of Love, which has the singer hoping that she's still as much in love at the age of 92 as she is today; That's What Mothers Do, a poignant, moving wish for a child; and the title track, which is a heartfelt ode to the Prairies, where Kaldor, who is now based in Quebec, grew up.

Folk music is often derided these days as sappy navel gazing by the granola set, but this CD, Kaldor's 13th, demonstrates what it can communicate at its best.

- Bruce Erskine, staff reporter