'It's a spiritual thing:' Long history between Gordon Lightfoot and Massey Hall

It was a relationship that lasted a lifetime: Gordon Lightfoot got his start at Massey Hall as a teenager, and never stopped returning to the Toronto venue, no matter how successful he became.

It was a relationship that lasted a lifetime: Gordon Lightfoot got his start at Massey Hall as a teenager, and never stopped returning to the Toronto venue, no matter how successful he became.

Hundreds of famous musicians have played the stage in its long history, but none so often as Lightfoot. The folk legend and the concert hall fed off each other's fame, sharing a sort of symbiosis that spanned more than half a century.

"It's a spiritual thing," Lightfoot told The Canadian Press in 2018. "I have an affinity for Massey Hall that's very strong."

When the concert hall closed down for major renovations that same year, his was the last performance. And when it reopened three years later, he was the one to usher in its new era with three consecutive shows.

They would be his last at the venue before his death on Monday at age 84.

The first of Lightfoot's 170-odd performances on the Massey stage happened when he was just 13 years old, after he won a Kiwanis competition, he told The Canadian Press.

"It was a beautiful thing to stand there unamplified, accompanied by a piano. I remember the thrill of being in front of the crowd. We had a lot of people in there. And it was a stepping stone for me. I was getting somewhere," he said.