11 March 2022 - The Ottawa-born singer-songwriter was popular in both English Canada and French Canada in 1979.

The Ottawa singer-songwriter talks to the CBC's Paul Soles on the late-night talk show Canada After Dark (click through for this video). Cockburn has a long history in the CBC archives.

In 1969, he played the Mariposa Folk Festival on the Toronto Islands alongside other artists including Joni Mitchell and Joan Baez. CBC filmed those performances for a special that aired that fall.

Within about a year, Cockburn would be featured many more times on CBC-TV, appearing in a special called Rock One, an episode of This Land focusing on musicians speaking out about environmental issues and on The Tommy Hunter Show.

In 1978, Cockburn was a guest on the late-night talk show Canada After Dark, performing his song Laughter before joining host Paul Soles at his desk for an interview.

"So glad you're here. That was pretty," said Soles, holding a copy of Cockburn's new record. (The clip above does not include the performance due to copyright restrictions.) "It's from this, your newest album, the Further Adventures Of, uh, the world, I would gather."

"Well, just the Further Adventures Of," clarified Cockburn. He then spoke at length about one of his more recent adventures at the time: being a father.

"Cockburn, the bilingual balladeer, sings his way right across French Quebec as if he were Québécois," said reporter David Bazay. "In fact, he's from Ottawa."

Cockburn said he wasn't sure why not many musicians from English Canada played in Quebec. He just knew that he wanted to perform for audiences there, and maybe not everyone did.

"I'm not sure that the two solitudes concept is really accurate," he said while seated in front of a poster for Further Adventures of. "I think people on both sides of that fence are a lot more willing to talk than the image would have us think."

Canada Listens can be heard on CBC Music starting on Monday, April 11.