Gale Zoë Garnett (born 17 July 1942)[1] is a New Zealand-born Canadian singer best known in the United States for her self-penned, Grammy-winning folkhit "We'll Sing in the Sunshine". Garnett has since carved out a career as an author and actress.
Garnett was born in Auckland, New Zealand, and moved to Canada with her family when she was 11.[1] She made her public singing debut in 1960, while at the same time pursuing an acting career, making guest appearances on television shows such as 77 Sunset Strip.[1]
Riding the success of "We'll Sing in the Sunshine", which won a 1965 Grammy for Best Folk Recording, sold over one million copies thus gaining gold disc status,[5] Garnett continued to record through the rest of the 1960s with her backing band the Gentle Reign. Her follow-up to "We'll Sing in the Sunshine", "Lovin' Place", was her only other single to chart in America.[1] She appeared twice on ABC's Shindig! and The Lloyd Thaxton Show at the height of her singing fame in the mid-1960s.
Garnett delivered a notable performance in the Rankin-Bass feature Mad Monster Party in the late 1960s, with the memorable tunes "Our Time to Shine" and "Never Was a Love Like Mine." At this period she had begun to be more influenced by the counterculture, and had embraced psychedelic themes to some extent.[1][6] In the late 1960s she recorded two albums of psychedelic-inflected music with the Gentle Reign.
Although Garnett had retired from the music business by the 1980s,[1] she continued occasionally appearing in feature films (including the 2002 sleeper hitMy Big Fat Greek Wedding) and on television shows, usually in supporting roles.[citation needed]
In subsequent years, she branched out into journalism, writing essays, columns, and book reviews for various newspapers and magazines. She also wrote and performed two one-person theater pieces, Gale Garnett & Company and Life After Latex.[8][9]
Garnett also did the voice of the "Mother KOIT" liners for KOIT-FM (93.3 FM) in San Francisco in the mid to late 1960s during its progressive rock formatted era (1968–1970).[10]
Books by Garnett
Garnett published her first novel, a romance titled Visible Amazement,[11] in 1999. She followed with Transient Dancing (2003), the novella Room Tone (2007), and Savage Adoration, her latest release (2009).
Track listing: I Know You Rider / Take This Hammer / Oh Brandy Leave Me Alone / Malaika / Little Man, Nine Years Old / I Came To The City / Pretty Boy / Wanderin' / Prism Song / We'll Sing In The Sunshine / Sleep You Now / Fly Bird
1997 CD reissue additional tracks: Lovin' Place / St. James Infirmary / God Bless The Child / Excuse Me Mister / We'll Sing In The Sunshine (alternate version)
Lovin' Place (1965)
Track listing: Lovin' Place / You Are My Sunshine / You've Been Talkin' 'Bout Me Baby / Where Do You Go To Go Away / Big Grey City / Nobody Knows You When You're Down And Out / What-cha Gonna Do / I Used To Live Here / The Sunny Song / St. Louis Is A Long Way Away / Little Poppa / O Freedom
The Many Faces of Gale Garnett (1965)
Track listing: Won't You Be My Lover / Excuse Me Mister / As Much As I Can / Marionette / Ain't Gonna Stay In Love Alone / God Bless The Child / Settle Down / The Question Song / Long Time Blues / Forget It / I Wish You Were Here / St. James Infirmary
Variety Is the Spice of Gale Garnett (1965)
Track listing: Why Am I Standing At The Window / A Little Bit Of Rain / Has Anyone Here Seen Me? / Small Potatoes / The Same Game / Carrick Fergus / The Other Side Of This Life / Love Games / I'm Gonna Be Myself By Myself / If You Go Away Again / People Come And Go / Sometime You Gotta Let Somebody Down
Growing Pains, Growing Pleasures (1966)
Track listing: Just Wait And See / It's Been A Lovely Summer / Little Something On The Side / Blue Prelude / Starting Anew / Put Your Hands Down / Morning Dew / Sun Must Shine / You've Got To Fall In Love Again / No Other Name / This Child / Nice Man
New Adventures (1966)
Track listing: Oh There'll Be Laughter / Calm And Collected / Where Did You Go? / Angle Song / Scarlett Ribbons (For Her Hair) / That Was Me You Ran Over / So Long / Let The Lonely Go / Followin' The Rain / Back With Me / It Ain't Necessarily So
Gale Garnett Sings About Flying and Rainbows and Love and Other Groovy Things (1967)
Track listing: I Make Him Fly / Don't Hurt Him / You're Gone Now / Just Wait And See / No Other Name / This Child / Over The Rainbow / Lie To Me Easy / You're Doing Me No Good / The Sun Is Gray / Look Who's Here / I Am Shining
An Audience with the King of Wands (Columbia, 1968; with The Gentle Reign)
Track listing: Breaking Through / Fall In Love Again / Mini-Song #1: Ophelia Song / Ballad For F. Scott Fitzgerald / Big Sur / Mini-Song #2: Tropicana High / That's Not The Way / A Word Of Advice / Believe Me / Mini-Song #3: Lament For The Self-Sufficient / You Could Have Been Anyone / Bad News / Dolphins / Mini-Song #4: Tropicana Low
Sausalito Heliport (Columbia, 1969; with The Gentle Reign)
Track listing: Freddy Mahoney / Peace Comes Slowly To The Trashing Fish / The Pretty Is Gone / This Year's Child / Berkeley Barb Want Ad / Deer In The City / Water Your Mind / My Mind's Own Morning / The Trip Note Song / Man In The Middle / Freely Speaking
Singles (partial list)
"We'll Sing in the Sunshine" (1964) – US No. 4 Pop, No. 1 Adult Contemporary, No. 42 Country b/w "Prism Song" (RCA 8388)
"Lovin' Place" (1964) – US No. 54 Pop b/w "I Used To Live Here" (RCA 8472)
"I'll Cry Alone" (1965) b/w "Where Do You Go To Go Away" (RCA 8549)
"Why Am I Standing at the Window" (1965) b/w "I'm Gonna Sit Right Down And Write Myself A Letter" (RCA 8668)
"You've Got To Fall in Love Again" / "It's Been A Lovely Summer" (1966) (RCA 8961)
"This Kind Of Love" / "Oh There'll Be Laughter" (1966) (RCA 8824)
"I Make Him Fly" / "The Sun Is Gray" (1966) (RCA 9020)
"Over The Rainbow" / "The Cats I Know" (1967) (RCA 9196)
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