Garnet Rogers (born May 1955) is a Canadian folk musician, singer, songwriter and composer. He was born in Hamilton, Ontario with roots in Nova Scotia.[1] He began his professional career working with his brother, folk musician Stan Rogers,[2] and arranging Stan’s music.
Despite and ever since Stan Rogers’ death on June 2, 1983 (just a few weeks before Stan, Garnet and bass player Jim Morison were to tour America), Garnet Rogers has pursued his own career.[3]
At first, Garnet had difficulty getting a permit from the U.S. Immigration Service, which only granted one after a campaign on his behalf was launched by Odetta, The Boston Globe, and a PBS TV station in New York.[citation needed]
While his brother’s style of writing was more traditional and often based on Canadian Maritime styles, Garnet’s style is more modern, utilizing influences from blues, rock, country/bluegrass, and classical.[4]
Rogers’ instruments include the guitar, mandolin, violin, and flute. In live performances, he usually sits beside a guitar rack that includes three vintage Gibson acoustic guitars, a National guitar, a Fender Stratocaster, and sometimes a Hammertone Octave 12 (half-scale electric 12-string guitar).[5]
His songs include The Outside Track, All That Is, Sleeping Buffalo, Night Drive, Under The Summer Moonlight, Summer Lightning, Small Victory, and Frankie and Johnny. They range from slices of life to mild social commentary and humour. His humour is also seen in his on-stage banter between songs,[2] mostly unrecorded, except for a couple of interludes on his brother’s posthumous album, “Home in Halifax”. In addition, Garnet has covered other folk artists’ work, including Roy Forbes’ (Bim’s) Woh Me, and Archie Fisher’s The Final Trawl. His collaborators include Doug McArthur and Doug Long.[6]
Garnet has also written “Night Drive” a memoir of his travels with his brother Stan Rogers, who died in a fire aboard an Air Canada Flight in 1983.[7]
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