Straker performs the piano in a stereotypical Sask. scene. (submitted/Jeffery Straker)

By Susan McNeil

Great Big Sky, great big plans

New album focuses on life under a ‘Great Big Sky’

May 21, 2024 | 2:38 PM

Solving the paradox of vast open spaces of land and ‘Prairie skyscrapers’ in Saskatchewan is one item that will soon be checked off on Jeffery Straker’s to-do list.

A new 10-track album is about to drop on June 7 and Straker will follow that up with a concert series in seven communities – all featuring a grain elevator.

To celebrate the release of Great Big Sky, Straker will do a tour inspired by the song More than Two by Fours and Timber this summer.

“I’m fortunate to call the Prairies home. A place that reminds, inspires, lifts and grounds me,” he said in a news release.

“Great Big Sky is about being lost and then being found again, it’s a whisper painted on a giant canvas, and its gratitude for not knowing all the answers but being able to ask all the questions. This great big sky we live under is an amazing thing.”

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Both of his parents have passed away in the last five years and it was they that made him thankful for a childhood “in a beautiful place”.

The song More than Two by Fours comes from a personal place in Straker’s history.

Growing up on a grain farm near Punnichy Saskatchewan one of his first summer jobs was cleaning the boot of the old Pool elevator with a five-gallon bucket.

“That’s when I first developed an intimate relationship with grain elevators, down there with the mice and the dust and everything” he said. A few years ago that elevator – the last of four that once stood in a row – was torn down.

The album comes out on June 7 and was produced by Steve Dawson in Nashville in order to give it the strong rootsy vibe that Shraker wanted.

The concert series starts on June 15 in Elbow. Some will be outside of the elevator and others will be inside.

The remaining events are:

June 19 – The Museum of Wheat, Hepburn

June 20 – Southey (a 2nd show has been added June 27)

July 4 – Riverhurst

July 5 – Take a train excursion with him on the Southern Prairie Railway from Ogema to Horizon where he performs in the old Horizon elevator

July 6 – Gravelbourg

July 7 – The Sukanen Ship Pioneer Village south of Moose Jaw

Straker is also performing at the Sasktel Jazz Festival on July 11.

Ticket and concert info is available at his website and some of the proceeds will go towards local heritage and community projects.

His album was completed with some financial help from Creative Saskatchewan.

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susan.mcneil@pattisonmedia.com