Once more, with heart
Canuck singer Chantal Kreviazuk unfurls new Colour

Some sensitive singer songwriters are so sensitive they can't even talk about their songs without breaking into tears.

Don't mistake Chantal Kreviazuk for an emotional wimp - and she's not going to bore you with poems about living in a van - but this Winnipeg singer fits the profile. At least once during an interview to promote her new album, Colour Moving and Still, she threatens to cry.

Her music can do that, she says. Sometimes all it takes is one chord.

Kreviazuk describes the writing of Until We Die as the opening of a floodgate. It's a love song dealing with her long-distance relationship with fiance Raine Maida, lead singer of Our Lady Peace, who co-wrote two of the tracks on the album. She's reluctant to discuss their relationship other than to confirm they are getting married and "we're really, really happy." But they don't see each other very often - and Kreviazuk isn't likely to share a stage with Our Lady Peace in the near future. Hence the song.

"I was alone at home when we came off the road," she recalls. "I'm not going to get into details, but I was still alone, and I was expecting someone to come home off the road as well, and it was hard. I was just having a bad day. I just sat down at the piano, played this chord and it started this song. It was pouring out of me so fast that I could hardly stop to write the lyrics down. I was crying so hard I had to stop and dry my eyes."

Personal music

Good thing it wasn't D-minor (the saddest of all keys, as Spinal Tap's Nigel Tufnel observed) - "Yeah, I might not even be here," she laughs. "No, it was a G-major chord. And that one chord set the whole thing off."

Wearing her heart on her sleeve for all to hear and marvel over is a relatively recent decision for Kreviazuk, who's playing a sold-out show in the Winspear Centre Monday night. Hardly a note within Colour Moving and Still lacks impact. From love, death, longing and heartache comes some of the most emotional and intensely personal music you'll hear. Framed in richly textured sounds and her clear, evocative voice, it's obvious she means every word, too. Kreviazuk wouldn't have it any other way.

"I had the pleasure of touring a song called Surrounded on my first album," she says. "I didn't realize how important it was to play a song live every night that really came from the bottom, bottom of your heart. I learned a very valuable lesson from that, because I sort of made a deal with myself after that whole tour. I never wanted to get up and sing a song I've written that didn't give me that same feeling. It's not as rewarding. I can still get that, on any night. When I play the first chord of Surrounded, I'm back in."

Scooping out the bottom of one's heart and making songs come out the other end isn't easy. Coming off her solo tour supporting her 1996 debut, Under These Rocks and Stones, Kreviazuk ran face-first into that bane of all recording artists under deadline to write a second album: the dreaded writer's block. There were projects to take up the slack - a version of John Denver's Leaving on a Jet Plane on the Armageddon soundtrack, a new song for Dawson's Creek - but the pressure was on.

"There were a few days where I was really scared," she says. "So I decided, you know what? I'm just going to start living again. So I did and it was the best thing I could've done. A couple of really incredible things happened in those few months. I got to meet a beautiful young lady who had been diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumour. Her family and she were aware that she only had a few months to live. She was 12 years old. So I got to know them and went though this time with them, and it changed my life. And this child was so very special, I can't even talk about her right now without crying. She's the most amazing person I've ever met. There's a song called M on the record that's a tribute to her and her parents.

Songs to friends

"I wrote Surrounded about a friend of mine who passed away. And when he died, I had to watch parents losing their child. And then when my little friend died, I had to watch parents losing their child. And it seems to be very unnatural. So the lyric in that song is 'they must be in business to say there's nothing worse than to let your precious love child leave the planet first.'

"It's so amazing. This girl knew she was dying, but she was still a 12-year-old. This extremely mature, old, old thing is about to happen to a person on the cusp of teenagerhood. So her parents, of course, wanted to capture her on film as much as possible. There was always either a camcorder or a camera on her, always this thing of, 'Oh, we need to take your picture.' And yet she didn't want her picture taken, which is very natural for a teenager. So within that song came the second verse, 'So I think we're going to have to record her, sometimes against her will, we're going to keep her alive with black and whites, colour moving and still.' Hence the title of my album."

Kreviazuk's eyes are bright as she relates this, but she's not crying.

By: Mike Ross