Harlequin was known for extended, intricate instrumental passages that featured
Joel’s violin over Steve’s fingerpicking acoustic guitar style.
The band was
home to more than a dozen different members including Ellen Shizgal, Linda Morrison, Howard
Engel, Jim Dobbins, Suzanne Unger, Liz Tanzey and Gilles Bernard, nearly all of
whom are still performing. Later the band included electric sets but always
retained elements of its folk roots.
The band debuted at McGill’s Redpath Hall in 1974 and went on to record at Radio
McGill and the CBC. They performed regularly at the Yellow Door, Golem
Coffeehouse, Rainbow Bar & Grill, and other venues around town and
throughout the province. During the summers Steve and Joel would street-sing on Rue
Ste. Catherine.
Twenty-five years later, Joel and Steve recaptured some of that vibe on Steve’s CD Packwood in Morris Apelbaum’s Silent Sound Studio in
Montreal.
Morris was the original sound tech and official chaperone to the band. Joel has
performed as part of the McGarrigle Sisters’ band for many years. Morris won a Juno for
a jazz album he produced.
Despite the band’s success, years of working and living together amidst
constantly changing personnel fostered inevitable tensions. Steve left the band
around 1977 and put together The Hard Times Review before concluding that as an
American in Canada his options were limited, so he returned to the States.
With his girlfriend Barri, he moved to San Diego to form a band with his oldest friend and bandmate
from his first eighth grade band. That friend, John Kargacos, lived in Santee, California, and Steve says his first nights there he
would lie awake at night to the sound of helicopters and coyotes.
Steve offers a few of his impressions of their band, Streetlife, under the
Releases
section. Steve and Barri got married in San Diego in 1979. They are
still together, but a little more than a year later the band broke up.
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