>"Four Strong Winds" is OK, but I would have expected to see "Someday >Soon" listed first among Ian & Sylvia songs.

But you'd be wrong, wouldn't you? Mostly because although an Ian Tyson song, it is associated with Judy Collins, and like many of Tyson's compositions, it is full of American place names. It just sounds better with Judy singing it. (I have sung it a lot actually, but it's hard to make the gender switches sound natural). And realistically, her version is most significant for introducing pedal steel to mainstream radio.

>Among Gordon Lightfoot compositions, why not "Edmund Fitzgerald" >before "Early Morning Rain"?

Because it's boring I guess. Lightfoot was the only performer to have three songs on the list, aside from Rain and Railroad Tril, "Sundown" aka The Ballad Of Cathy Evelyn Smith Before She Killed John Belushi was farther back there.

>Nobody likes "In the early morning rain"?

Early Morning Rain is NUMBER TEN on the list. Do people not read before they post any more?

>Also, I have to wonder how difficult it must have been to pick one >or two individual numbers from the Joni Mitchell songbook.

Not at all. Enough people picked the ones they remembered and liked the most...Both Sides Now and Big Yellow Taxi. Not rocket science folks!

>Another great bit of Canadian songwriting from the Folk Scare >Era: "Child's Song," recorded and popularized by Tom Rush but >written by a Torontonian whose name escapes me.

Murray McLauchlan of course. He wrote a lot of good songs, but if he had made the list it would have been for "Farmer's Song" or possibly "Down By The Henry Moore". Farmer's Song would have qualified as "popular, essential and Canadian" by virtue of being a Top 40 hit on AM commercial and country radio--a rare achievement in 1975.

>Any why nothing by The Band? Are they disqualified by the presence >of Levon, who made them only 4/5 Canadian?

"The Weight" weighed in, as has been mentioned. Read the friggin list before complaining about what's on it.

As for qualifying as Canadian, I believe they used the standard formula that legally defines Canadian content for radio play: must have at least two of:

1. lyrics by a Canadian
2. music by a Canadian
3. performer Canadian
4. recorded in Canada

We have had to think about this kind of stuff way too much.

Wade Hemsworth was mentioned by a number of callers, but did not make the list. Remember, the song would have had to be popular, AND be associable with a particular decade to get enough votes.
It's not a measure of quality. Rick Fielding didn't make the list either.

W-O