Seldom have I seen an audience rise so quickly to sweep in a wave across an auditorium floor to a CDs for sale booth than at intermission during the Stew and Juanita Clayton Concert at Exhibition Park, September 1. The nearly 800 rose almost as one to meet the father and daughter duo as they reached it and, at 5 a.m. when we drove them to the airport their CD cases were all but empty.
Seldom, either, have I had as many calls after a concert for a recording stars address saying “well, I bought one but I’d like to get a couple more” or “I bought Juanita’s because I only had enough for one, now I’d like to get one of her father’s” or “there were so many I couldn’t make up my mind. How do I contact them?”
That’s right, the long reigning star of Winnipeg’s Sunshine Record label has recorded over 30 lps, cassettes and CD’s in the past half century and he said while here that he was thinking of doing another.
That one Yodeling My Way Back Homearrived Christmas week! Stew records the old fashioned way: He walks into a studio with backing musicians and wings it the way Wilf Carter always did! And if you think that didn’t work for Wilf in fairly modern times…well, toward the end of his recording career in the early 1980s, Wilf’sWalking The Streets of Calgary RCA Camden lp according to a survey by a Sam the Record Man Halifax store manager, Jimmy Dean, of their outlets and other national distributors was the top seller of its release year but when R.P.M. Magazine, compilers of Canada’s Top 100 records at the time, didn’t even list it, their answer when he inquired was: “Oh, we don’t chart anyone over 60. They’ve no career left.”
Anyhow though it may never officially get its dues either, Stew’s new CD Yodeling My Way Back Homewill be a joy to the ears of anyone who remembers the great years of Country & Western music. An eleven times international yodeling champion Stew explains his choice of songs for this CD in this way: ‘For many years I have been asked why I don’t put more yodel songs on my recordings. When doing shows, folks who stop by my booth will nearly always ask ‘which album has the most yodel songs on it?”
“Well, on this new release there is only one selection…the Johnny Cash Song …that isn’t a yodel song. I sincerely hope all my fans and all those who have ever felt bereft at the lack of yodeling on records now will enjoy this recording. I made it especially for them.”
The yodel songs are: The Old Harvest Waltz, I Love To Hear Her Yodel, The Yodeling Trucker (a comedic demonstration of voice dexterity and endurance), Answer To My Little Yodel Lady, The Yodeling Farmers Song, Blue Mountain Yodel, My Little Artic Sweetheart, Yodeler’s Waltz and the title song: Yodeling My Way Back Home. All ten were penned by Stew.
Copies of it are available by calling him at (204) 242-2670. You will likely get the message: “Hello, this is Yodeling Stew from Manitou. If I’m not here I’m most likely out doing a show somewhere but leave a message and I’ll get back to you.” Which he will do! Or write: Stew Clayton, P.O. Box 147, Manitou, Manitoba, Canada R0G 1G0