Album Notes

Growing up in Australia, Peter Haines showed a love of music from an early age. His early musical influences, apart from his father, who was always singing around the house, were Don McLean, James Taylor, Gordon Lightfoot, along with Australian performers such as Ross Ryan and Eric Bogle. He learned to play the acoustic guitar around the age of twelve. In his late teens and early twenties in Darwin, Australia, Peter joined with his friend Ken Brodie to form the duo "Cool Change". They became popular on the Darwin music scene and were asked to play at the grand opening of that city's new performing arts centre. Haines first came to Canada on a year's teaching exchange in 1999. During this time he fell in love with the natural beauty and the people of the Bulkley Valley, British Columbia. He now lives there permanently with his Canadian wife, Paulie. On his first C.D., produced and recorded by highly respected Canadian roots & blues musician, David Essig, Haines exhibits a winning combination of strong song-writing and passionate, heartfelt delivery. His narratives, drawn from his experiences in both Australia and Canada are compelling and powerful, with the triumph of the human spirit over adversity an over-arching theme. Strong backup performances from David Essig (steel guitar, weisenborn, mandolin, backing vocal) , Tobin Frank (bass) and Roxi Dykstra (viola,fiddle & backing vocal) round out the album.