WILDFLOWER 50TH ANNIVERSARY

2023 marks the 50th anniversary of Skylark's Wildflower, the classic Canadian love ballad that endures genres and generations like sidewalk chamomile with over 100 covers and sample versions to become one of the most beloved and performed songs in the history of Canadian pop music.

"Let her cry for she's a lady, let her dream for she's a child." This tender refrain is recognized around the world, and though written and most often sung by men, the song owes its enduring success in large part to three women: BJ Cook was the force that envisioned and formed the band Skylark and midwifed its record deal; CKLW Program Director Rosalie Trombley picked Wildflower as a hit and ensured its release as a single; and music publisher Valley Hennell has represented the writers and protected the copyright for half a century.

Wildflower has been honoured with SOCAN Classic and Crystal Awards and a BMI Millionaire's Award. In 2011 it was inducted into Canadian Song Writers Hall of Fame. In September 2023 Skylark and David Foster were inducted into the BC Entertainment Hall of Fame, the same week a sculpture of Rosalie Trombley was unveiled in the City of Windsor, with Wildflower broadcast at both events.

BJ Cook and David Foster are two surviving members of the original Skylark band: guitarist/composer Doug Edwards, vocalist Donny Gerrard, bassist Steve Pugsley, drummer Duris Maxwell, B3 player Robbie King, bg vocalist Bobby Taylor and lyricist Dave Richardson have all passed. Vocalist Carl Graves and musicians Brian Hilton, Norm McPherson, John Verner and Allan Mix later toured with Skylark.

While Foster went on the worldwide acclaim, it was BJ who assembled the Skylark players and secured the Capitol Records deal that launched both the song and Foster's career. To this day Foster includes Wildflower in his Hitman concerts and credits BJ as the root of his success.

WILDFLOWER HISTORY

The Wildflower lyric was written in 1970 by Dave Richardson, then a young policeman in Saanich, BC, as a poem about his girlfriend who worked as a nurse at Royal Jubilee Hospital. He passed it along to his young musician friend David Foster, who was forming the band Skylark. Guitarist Doug Edwards fished the lyric out of a stack and composed the melody on organ in about half an hour - about as long as it took Richardson to write the words.

Wildflower was the third single from Skylark's self-titled first album for Capitol Records. The arrangement is built around a basic track featuring Doug Edwards on guitar, Steve Pugsley on bass and Duris Maxwell on drums - a first take run-through serendipitously captured by producer/engineer Eirik "the Norwegian" Wangberg. Every subsequent version emulates Edwards' haunting guitar solo and Donny Gerrard's passionate vocal. Only after it was recorded did Richardson give the song its name.

How did a poem written by a young policeman, set to music by a musician he had never met and recorded in a classic first take by an unknown Canadian band, launch the career of one of the world's best-known producers and become beloved around the globe? Wildflower is a one hit wonder whose success is an unlikely tale of luck, pluck, timing and tenacity. The song almost didn't get written, recorded or released. The title does not appear in the song's lyric. It defied all odds and broke every rule to become a pop and soul standard.

After the first two singles fizzled, Capitol Records released Wildflower in February 1973 as the third Skylark single at the insistence of hit maker Rosalie Trombley, Program Director at CKLW Windsor. It went to #1 on the Canadian adult contemporary charts and in May 1973 peaked at #9 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #10 on RPM singles chart.

That same year saxophonist Hank Crawford (Ray Charles' musical director) released an instrumental version featuring top New York session players (on an album entitled Wildflower) which decades later was sampled by 2pac Shakur (Shorty Wanna Be A Thug), Kanye West (Drive Slow), Drake (Miss Me) and young UK rapper Central Cee (Retail Therapy).

By the time Skylark released its second album in 1974 (which also included Wildflower as the title track) the song had been covered by Johnny Mathis, the New Birth, Jimmy Smith and the O'Jays. It's since been covered by artists as diverse as Colour Me Badd, The Neville Brothers and Gary Morris.

Rolling Stones singer Lisa Fischer sang it on her Grammy Award winning debut album So Intense. It was the only English song on Hong Kong super star Sandy Lam's classic Cantonese album called Wildflower. Blake Shelton performed a country version in David Foster's 2008 Hitman PBS broadcast/CD and it continues to be featured in his Hitman concerts around the globe.

In 2001 Tupac Shakur sampled the Hank Crawford version of Wildflower in the song Shorty Wanna Be A Thug on his last album, All Eyez On Me. In 2005 Jamie Foxx sampled the New Birth version in his mega hit Unpredictable which topped the charts simultaneously with Kanye West and Paul Wall's Drive Slow which they released on both Late Registration and The People's Champ.

In 2010 Canadian rapper Drake sampled Wildflower in the song Miss Me featuring Lil Wayne, the third single from his platinum CD Thank Me Later which debuted at #1 in both Canada and the US. In 2011 Estell sampled it in Thank You as an advance single from her CD All of Me. In 2022 award winning young British rapper Central Cee sampled it in Retail Therapy.

In 2011, Fleur Sauvage, a French translation by Canadian composer/chanteuse Joelle Rabu, was released by Paris vocalist Karolin Blandin as a single from the Maurice Gainen CD Sounds of Freedom. In 2015 Rabu released her own version on the CD Full Circle.

Wildflower is sung at weddings, funerals and graduations. It's been performed at the Olympics. It was featured in a film on prostitution in the ghetto and is the theme for a New York stage production about homelessness and heroin addiction. It is the soundtrack for a US Army Chaplain's video counseling female veterans with PTSD. It was featured on the TV series New York Undercover, whose writers didn't know it was written by a cop.

In 2018 British jazz luminary Liane Carroll performed Wildflower for Kirk Whelum's documentary film and CD Humanité. Sung in English by Journey lead singer Arnel Pineda, it's the theme song for a 200 episode Tagalog Filipino revenge drama entitled Wildflower now on Netflix.

David Foster in LA and BJ Cook in Victoria are the sole remaining surviving original members of Skylark—Doug Edwards, Steve Pugsley, Duris Maxwell, Robbie King, lyricist Dave Richardson and vocalist Donny Gerrard have all passed on.

When she met David, BJ Cook was already a pioneer in the nascent BC music scene. In the '60s she honed her craft as a showgirl and singer in clubs and bars in Vancouver, opening for stars like Johnny Cash, Della Reese, Marty Robbins and Nancy Wilson, touring with Spanky and Our Gang and The Delights, and fronting her own band Sweet Beaver before joining Ronnie Hawkins and The Hawks in Toronto. There she joined forces with a much younger David Foster, and in 1971 when Ronnie fired Foster for "looking like a cadaver on stage", they moved back to Vancouver and founded Skylark.

It was BJ's connections that led to the recording deal with Capitol Records and a move to LA. When after two albums, the birth of daughter Amy Skylark Foster and a divorce, they went their separate ways, BJ stayed in the biz, working as a PA for Jaye P Morgan and co-writing with Michael McDonald, Brenda Russell, and Bill Champlin. With her longtime collaborator Domenic Troiano she wrote the theme for Night Heat, Air Waves and Hot Shots. At age 81 BJ is still rockin' in Victoria, BC.

For many years Donny Gerrard performed and recorded with Mavis Staples, including the 2011 Grammy award winning album You Are Not Alone. He passed away in New Mexico in February 2022.

Doug Edwards performed with the classic Canadian rock band Chilliwack for two decades until his death in North Vancouver, BC on November 11, 2016.

After retiring from police work, David Richardson served as an addiction counsellor in Victoria and as a lay clergyman helping to feed the homeless and poor in Jerusalem. He died in Victoria, BC on August 25, 2019.

Since 1974 Wildflower and its writers have been represented by producer/publisher Valley Hennell who continues to document its remarkable history, contact her at info@wildflowersong.com.

Wildflower is administered worldwide for Edsel Music by Kobalt. For licensing contact licensing@kobaltmusic.com.

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Copyright © 2003 Edsel Music. All rights reserved.
Painting by China Goodhue china2@telus.net.
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