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Like greatness, some aspire to music, some have it thrust upon them and some are born to it. Tamara Nile is one of the latter. “Some of my first memories are of falling asleep to the sound of my mom and dad playing music in our one-room cedar shake cabin in Montague Harbour, Galiano Island. Jessie James, Irene Good Night, Buddy Can You Spare a Dime, and Midnight in Moscow are just a few of the numerous folk songs from several traditions that seeped through the un-insulated walls of our little house. Outside in the white canvas tent I slept in during the warm months, I would sometimes imagine grasshoppers playing the fiddle, dancing around a fire… tiny bugs mistaking the yellow flames for the moon, and sizzling quietly.” Mom was a musician and visual artist. Dad was a street musician known professionally as Dan The Man, The One Man Band. Tamara’s first instrument was the melodeon, on which she composed a song at the age of 3, and later on, when she was 6, she took violin lessons, and at 7, guitar. “My mom and I would sing Emmylou Harris, Linda Ronstadt and Kate and Anna McGarrigle songs together in harmony, with my sister yelling at us to “SHUT UP”… I guess we weren’t too hot… but it was one of the most fun parts of my life… We always had musical instruments around the house… and when my friends would come over… instead of watching TV, we would jam and draw for our entertainment.” Tamara’s father started his career as a “one man band” when she was in elementary school. He had a rig that let him play harmonica, accordion, tuba, trombone, cymbals and bass with foot pedals. Until she was 15 or so, every school holiday she traveled with her father around the Vancouver Area, Victoria, down to Venice Beach, San Francisco, even Australia. She learned balloon twisting at a Hollywood magic shop and remembers standing a couple of car lengths away from her dad at Venice beach dressed in a rainbow wig, the squishy red nose and oversized checkered jacket and amusing the California rich kids, talking Harpo Marx-style with a horn in her pocket. Later she would trade the horn for a banjo and guitar. At 19, Tamara moved to Vancouver to see if she could launch a music career. She took to hanging out at the Railway Club, getting to know people, swapping songs and ideas. Eventually she began hosting a monthly showcase at the railway originally called "Connect" now known as T. Nile Presents. She played with lots of the young rootsy artists coming up on the Vancouver scene- Kinnie Starr, The Minimalist Jug Band and Ridley Bent, to name a few. Meanwhile, she was working on her songwriting, putting together everything she had learned at home and away from home. Rather than rush out a CD, Tamara waited until she had the songs that would make a great debut. She did not want to spend the rest of her life apologizing for her first recording. In spring of 2006 she recorded and launched At My Table. You can hear the ‘alt country’ of Gillian Welch and the ‘high lonesome’ sound of Dock Boggs. Bob Marley is there as well and one song ends with thanks to Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee. While many of the musical influences come from south of here, the lyrics are very much about Tamara’s life on Galliano and in Vancouver. These songs are a personal summing up of her life so far. Trees is by her upbringing on the Gulf Islands; Rusty Door about touring with her dad. Others deal with relationships, good and bad, love gone right and wrong and people she knows or knew or wanted to know. Only Buddy Can You Spare A Dime is not written by her, and this classic of Depression America is a song that both connects her to her parents and their music and also reflects what she sees around her today. Reviewers and listeners have hailed the CD and its songs. Festival Distribution has picked it up and campus radio has fallen in love with it. Having performed lots in Vancouver and a bit around BC, Tamara Nile now knows she has a bigger audience listening to her and waiting for her to show up. A veteran touring artist by the time she was twelve, Tamara Nile is getting ready to go back on the road. |
