Penny Lang, Canadian folk musician, Died at 74

  Music

Penny Lang was born on July 15, 1942, and died on July 31, 2016.

She was a Canadian folk music icon who earned a loyal following, influencing many artists.

Lang performed at major folk festivals and clubs across North America.

During 1963, at age 21, she became a professional folksinger and worked initially at the Café André, a venue near the McGill University campus, for three years.

Penny quickly became a star on the Montreal folk scene, filling the club every night with a loyal returning audience drawn by her effective guitar-playing, throaty voice, and most of all by her astonishing ability to connect with the people she was singing to.

She moved on to become a touring artist, playing major folk festivals like Mariposa and Philadelphia and legendary clubs like Gerde’s Folk City in New York City, Caffè Lena in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., the Riverboat in Toronto and Le Hibou in Ottawa.

The major highlight of her career was her 1970 sold-out concert at Théâtre Port Royal at Place des Arts in Montreal.

Following an extended time away from professional life living in Morin Heights, a small village in the Laurentian Mountains where she raised her son Jason, she returned to full-time performing and recording in 1989 and recorded nine well-received albums for the She-Wolf, Festival and Borealis labels.

She died at her home in Madeira Park on British Columbia’s Sunshine Coast, where she had been living since 2005.

Penny Lang passed away at 74 years old.