I have just received the following sad news from Grit Laskin. He posted it to Maple Post, a mailing list about Canadian folk music. However, I think his references to "this list" apply equally well to Mudcat.


Many on this list will have known, or known about, the man who headed up Toronto's legendary Fiddler's Green folk club for its 20-year run.

He died late last night.

For those who did not know Tam....

He grew up in the tenement housing of Glasgow, Scotland, worked in the shipyards, but more importantly was instrumental in the folk scene there. While involved with the Glasgow Folk Centre, he remembers hiring Bob Dylan for 5 Pounds Sterling (Dylan's first UK tour), remembers the skinny kid who wanted to jam with everyone in the club's green room--who became Sting, took guitar lessons from Burt Jansch. To this day Billy Connolly (yes, the comedian/actor) credits Tam with making him a performer, by nagging him to accept some early gig offers, and actually driving Billy around Scotland to his gigs.

Tam grew up on skiffle and the UK folk revival. He played banjo and guitar and sang and was recruited into local pub bands from his first weeks in Canada. He emigrated here, around 1969 (I think) and within a year, with the help of another Scot, Jim Strickland, started Fiddler's Green.   

The stories around Tam and Fiddler's Green are many and I expect (and hope) more will seen, heard and read in the coming weeks and months.

But for a very large number of us, Tam was as good and as generous a friend as one could ever hope to have.