PLAIN FOLK

Abigail Johnson Follows Big Bootsteps into Kalan Country
by Les Pearson

How do you launch a music career when you are only 16, Canadian Idol will not give you an audition until you are 18, and there is a swelling expectation for you to fill Kalan’s jig-tight boots?

Start slowly. Compose and polish more original songs. Improve with expert coaching. And bide your time. Just ask Abigail Johnson. Her plan is in place.

Abigail is nearly “there.” She is the latest in a pearly string of talented singer-songwriters to take their first steps to music fame on a Medicine Hat stage. She and her brother will appear as Ron Mason’s guests at his CD Release Party scheduled for the Moose Lodge, February 18, at 8:00 p.m. Mark your calendar!

This event is co-sponsored by the Folk Music and Live Music Clubs. Ron is the Folk Music Club’s darling. He is a gifted, mature, songwriter who is celebrating his first recording.

Abigail is a gift from the Live Music Club. Her music has deep family roots. But for the past four months she has been the protegé of Bill desBarres and Betty Bischke, two tough-minded mentors who ride herd on the Live Music Club’s weekly jam at the Moose Lodge.

Abby describes their contribution to her development in these heartfelt terms. “Bill and Betty are amazing!” They have coached her breath control, keyboard expression, and vocal articulation.

Betty is one of our city’s outstanding pianists. Bill’s extensive professional keyboard career flows gently forward from his college days, a time just after the glaciers melted. (In fact, there is one geophysical theory that his jazz piano caused the thaw!) Both Bill and Betty have coached Abby in the fine art of performing.

Abby’s demo collection, with five original songs, is a landmark in her youthful songwriting career. At age 13, Abby composed The First Chapter. Since then, she has added steadily to the collection. Do not let her age fool you!

Her bassy vibrato and husky voice suggest someone much older. Someone who is decidedly more experienced. Glen Johnson, Abby’s Dad, explains the dark themes and world-wise perspective that are hallmarks of these first songs.

Glen was a mission pastor in the southern states when Abigail was a pre-teen. Glen used to sing and minister to addicts and prostitutes, “…the really hurting people.” Abby was there with him. “She got to spend a big part of her young life in very hurtful, very hard, situations.”

Abigail remembers those times and the vibrant singing in a Black congregation where Glen was guest pastor. She thinks the dark themes of her songs stem from reality that friends have shared with her. Their hurt became hers.

Already she knows that “…the best thing for me to do is to write about it in a song so that other people my age and other people who are older can relate to it.”

Such wisdom! Such talent! Don’t miss the CD Release Party!