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Dec. 1, 2006
The mystical musician
Noah reaches his arc with his latest CD release.
DAVE GORDON
Noah Zacharin's music is a bit of an enigma. It can't be easily
categorized, which makes each of his performances and albums a unique
treat.
Some say he's rock; others say he's folk. Still others say he's
a blues musician with rock and roll chops. His latest disc, his
sixth, has just been released. The album, Waiting on Your Love,
features 16 guest musicians playing everything from Irish bagpipes
to mandolin and saxophone.
However his music is defined, Zacharin, a fixture on the Toronto
music scene for more than a decade, is best known for playing a
fusion of styles – effortlessly blending them so they interact
with and enhance one another. He has toured coast to coast, in Israel,
in the United States and in a few spots in between. New tour dates
will be announced soon and fans new and old can expect to see Zacharin's
usual cross-Canada tour, a hodgepodge of American dates and perhaps
some overseas gigs.
Zacharin has spent more than 30 years honing his versatility as
a guitarist and lyricist. At 12, he was already beginning to improvise
and explore, leaving his music teacher in order to learn to play
guitar by ear.
"Mostly I learned by listening and watching other players,
by playing a lot, along with records and by my lonesome, on the
phone while speaking to others, while watching TV, while eating,
studying," said Zacharin in an interview.
He's been listening to that musician's intuition since he picked
up his first guitar at age nine, wrote his first song at 15 and
began performing his own material at 17.
"What I do constantly is write and play, which I do each morning
while I have my first coffee. It has become a ritual of discovery
and slow awakening, far more generous than the alarm clock and frying
eggs and hurtling towards a taxi or a traffic jam."
Music critics and reviewers across Canada have lauded Zacharin for
his developed wordplay and skilfully penned melodies - melodies
just as easy to listen to in a club as in your own living room.
The language Zacharin weaves around this musical journey is a poetic
invocation of emotional earthquakes and subconscious rainstorms
– a true mosaic of passionate gateways.
Learning his lyrical style in the Montreal poetry scene before moving
to Toronto in 1987, he has published hundreds of poems, reviews
and translations internationally. He was also active in the poetry
scene while still living in Quebec, participating frequently in
public readings.
Though he shies away from the obvious comparison to other Jewish
musical poets, Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen, his Judaism does inspire
his art. "The consciousness that I am a Jew forms much of what
I write; sometimes G-d appears as a theme in my songs," he
said.
In fact, where music and G-d meet, every now and again Zacharin
can be spotted at Toronto's Minsker shul, leading the congregation
in soulful renditions of the Sabbath songs. There, he has also learned
a great deal about singing in the service of others, he said.
Melodically, Zacharin paints a spectrum on his palette and, lyrically,
the rich detail is there to brighten the canvas. In the end, he
is less concerned with the music as he is with how it affects people.
"When people tell me they're really impressed with my playing,
I say, 'that's good, but were you moved?' Music is an expression,
not an athletic event."
For information on Zacharin's CDs or upcoming concerts, visit www.noahsong.com.
Dave Gordon is a freelance writer whose work can be seen
in the Baltimore Sun, Pittsburgh Post Gazette, and the
Toronto Sun.
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