Welcome one and all to another #TuneUpThursdays offering!

Unfortunately, this week's track is another tribute week, as Canada (as well as the world) has lost one of it's musical geniuses.

Our Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in his comments yesterday, "Canada is less as a country without Gord Downie". It just shows the impact of Gord Downie and The Hip had on all of us, individually, and as a nation.

The tribute track however, also comes with an awesome story.

As I heard of Downie's passing yesterday morning, I delayed the track I had prepared to launch today, as I felt I really needed to honour The Hip's front man with one of my favourite Tragically Hip songs - but I couldn't find sheet music anywhere. And usually, the universe gives me a few days to figure this stuff out.

But then I remembered a video that I saw on the CBC YouTube channel last year, where a high school choir from North Vancouver, Windsor Secondary School, had performed an acapella cover of what happens to be my favourite Hip song. So without a second to lose, I called up the school while I was on break from rehearsal, and asked to speak to the Choral director at the school.

Lucky for me, he was available to chat, and I explained to him about the Tune-Up Thursdays project, my with to produce a tribute to Gord Downie, and asked if I would be able to use what turned out to be his arrangement of "Ahead By A Century". He said "yes".

What happened next was nothing short of kismet. He had asked me to e-mail him, to make a formal request for the arrangement - so I asked for his name, since the secretary that forwarded me to him wasn't very clear with his name. Adam Kozak.

That's when all the lights went "ding!" and I instantly recognized his name.

Adam and I had performed together in my very first professional show back in 2004 entitled "Dregs: Rock Bottom" . It was a show written by a very good friend of ours, Buff, about a girl's journey from running away, to getting brought into an unfavourable situation, and how she got out - which was a subject near and dear to Buff's heart. But that's a post for another time.

So Adam and I ended up having a great chat about choral music, and choral education. I have a feeling this won't be the last time you'll be hearing one of Adam's arrangements here on Tune-Up Thursdays.

Without further ado, please enjoy my cover of Adam Kozak's arrangement of The Tragically Hip's classic - "Ahead By A Century".

And as always, if you like what you hear, please share with your friends and family.

Side note: I love to collaborate!!! If you'd like to record a Tune-Up Thursdays track with me, just drop me a line at Aerhyn.Lau@gmail.com and we'll work on something together to record! Or if you have an acapella arrangement of a song you've been working on, please share it with me and I'll do a recording of it! Or, if you have a song request, message me and I'll try my best to make it happen!

OH OH OH!!! And Christmas is rapidly approaching! Which means #Season2 of #AerhynsAcapellaAdvent is already in pre-production!!! If you have any Christmas tunes that you'd like to hear in this year's musical advent offering, email them to: AerhynsAcapellaAdvent@gmail.com

See you next week!!!

#GordDownie #ThankYouGordDownie #RIPGordDownie #TragicallyHip