Website
Facebook

BIOGRAPHY:

Ian Tyson has long been one of Canada's most respected singer-songwriters. A pioneer who began his career in the early days of the first folk boom in the 60s, he was one of the first Canadians to break into the American popular music market. In the years that followed he hosted his own TV show, recorded some of the best "folk" albums ever made, quit the music business, and became - after years of backbreaking work - a rodeo rider and a successful rancher.

Beginning his career at the age of 24, Tyson left behind the itinerant logging and rodeo life of British Columbia and hitchhiked to Toronto. Caught up in the folk music revival, he formed, along with a very young Sylvia Fricker, the legendary singing duo of Ian and Sylvia.

The duo married in 1964, forming what was to become one of the most influential country acts both in Canada and abroad, and recorded over a dozen timeless albums.

Tyson’s songs have been covered by Neil Young, Judy Collins, Suzy Bogguss, Gordon Lightfoot, Bobby Bare and Ramblin’ Jack Elliott among many others.

After a break, Tyson returned to making music with a vengeance in the mid-80s. At that point he found it a challenge to combine his two separate lives in new songs that explained the reality of "western culture" and the mindset of a cowboy in a sometimes-alien world. It was during this time his acclaimed "Cowboyography" series of albums for Stony Plain Records, brought him his first JUNO Award.

After hosting a popular, national Canadian television show from 1970-75, and the marriage with Ian and Sylvia ended, Tyson followed his dreams to return to the Canadian West to farm and train horses in Southern Alberta.

Tyson is a recipient of the Order of Canada and in 2005 CBC Radio One listeners chose his song, ‘Four Strong Winds’ as the greatest Canadian song of all time, during a radio series titled “50 Tracks: The Canadian Version”.