He always gets a bit nervous before going on stage, but George Canyon said that's a good thing. Canyon performed at the CN Centre Friday along with main act Toby Keith and opening act One More Girl.
Canyon took time out before the concert to sit down with The Citizen and chat about what's coming up in his musical and philanthropic career.
"Before every show, whether it's in front of one person or 20,000 - doesn't matter, there's always butterflies," said Canyon. "The day you stop getting butterflies is the day you're over confident."
Playing on the same stage as Toby Keith is really cool, said Canyon.
"This tour is different," said Canyon. "It really made me feel good that they wanted me to tour with Toby - I'm going up and doing an hour (not opening for Keith) and I never had that opportunity before and Toby and his crew, oh my gosh, are so fantastic and everyone gets along so well."
Canyon's new album Better Be Home Soon is in stores March 22. It's named after a Crowded House song he used to sing in high school.
"It's a record that Richard Marx and I co-produced," he added. "Richard is a treasure and a very good friend of mine and we've shared a lot of laughs. We didn't know what kind of album we were going to make and I was excited to watch it grow and unfold."
The pair wrote a lot of the songs on the album and co-wrote with other writers as well.
"With this record we ended up really touching on my past," said Canyon. "Growing up in Nova Scotia I played all kinds of music - not just country - to me it was all just music."
He would listen to a song and think it was great. It didn't matter if it was Cat Stevens, Randy Travis or AC DC, he added.
Canyon has been named 2011 spokesperson for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. This is a very important cause to Canyon, who was diagnosed with Type I diabetes when he was 14 years old.
"For the last six years I've talked with kids in Canada and the United States," said Canyon. "Telling them my story and trying to give them hope to achieve and accomplish anything they want to and not have their diabetes stand in the way. I was told I would never be in the military and never fly airplanes and at 14 that was the only thing I wanted to do. That dream was taken from me and I've been flying now for three years as a pilot and going on my fourth year as an honourary Colonel in the Air Force. So I tell the kids if I can do this you can definitely do this. You just have to take control of your disease and not let your disease take control of you. These kids get it, they're just so smart."
Better Be Home soon is one of Canyon's all time favourite songs and there's a song that Kenny Rogers and Richard Marx wrote for him called When Love is All you've Got that Marx and Canyon sing as a duet which is also tops for him.
Richard Marx said he wanted to write a song about Canyon.
"He says I am a real cowboy - I have a ranch and broken ribs and done all that, so we wrote a song called The Real Thing, which is a lot of fun," said Canyon. "Richard said we needed to write this and I just laughed at him but it turned out to be a great song and I still laugh when I hear the song."
See more of Christine Skorepa's interview with George Canyon on The Citizen's online video gallery.
