GREAT LAKE SWIMMERS / band
Fifty-five years ago, Marilyn Bell took a plunge and traversed Lake Ontario. Back then, being a Great Lake swimmer was a big deal; now, it’s an astonishing physical feat taken for granted. It’s a rapidly forgotten part of history, like a faded map or a tattered photograph. Or a lost channel.
Tony Dekker’s Great Lake Swimmers have spent the past seven years performing on stages around the world—though, like Bell, they should never be taken for granted. LOST CHANNELS, their fourth album set for release on March 31st, finds them once again recording at historic locations. This time in the Thousand Islands region of Ontario and New York state, telling tales of hidden histories, still “mining for light in the dark wells,” still “tuned to an instrument of greater and unknown design.”
Four albums into an already-rich and storied career, Great Lake Swimmers’ live show has won them ever-expanding audiences in the United States and Europe, and of course their native Canada. In 2008 Great Lake Swimmers shared the stage with an impressive list of artists, including Feist, Bela Fleck & The Sparrow Quartet, Hayden, Goldfrapp, Bill Callahan of Smog, and Robert Plant & Alison Krauss.
