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For the past 28 years, folk trio Tiller\u2019s Folly<\/a> has told significant tales of B.C. history via its nine albums of singalong songs.<\/p>\n With the release of their latest tune, Apple Box Belles, the band honours\u00a0a proud moment in the past and life in the present day.<\/p>\n Apple Box Belles recounts the story of Okanagan fruit orchards during the period from 1914-1918. With many of the region\u2019s service-aged men shipped off to fight in the First World War, their jobs were taken up by local women. One of the prime crops was apples, which needed manual sorting and packing.<\/p>\n The women who did this work were dubbed Apple Box Belles, which inspired the song\u2019s title.<\/p>\n Apple packing competitions were regularly held across the colonies to showcase packers\u2019 skills. In 1937, Kelowna\u2019s Isobel Stillingfleet was sent to the world apple packing event in Birmingham, England, and won.<\/p>\n She was named the Apple Queen of the British Empire.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen we started the band, part of what I wanted to do was follow the Celtic tradition of preserving history through song, as is done in all of those centuries-old Irish and Scottish folk classics,\u201d said guitarist Bruce Coughlan, who performs on Tiller\u2019s Folly with bassist Laurence Knight and mandolinist Nolan Murray.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I left home with my guitar on my back at age 14, I started busking and stopping at all the historic sites and spots along the way. In 1997, we began the Stirring Up Ghosts project around preserving a portion of that fascinating history in songs and stories of Pacific Canadian history, such as the Apple Box Belles.\u201d<\/p>\n The first Stirring Up Ghosts album was released in 2008, compiling history specific tracks from the group\u2019s previous two albums. The 12-tune release came with an accompanying 32-page booklet containing background information, archival photos and song lyrics. There have been a total of three Stirring Up Ghosts releases, with the most recent being 2024\u2019s Way Out West EP.<\/p>\n \u201cStirring Up Ghosts started when we began playing elementary schools across the province and was the name that I gave to the study guide I developed to intrigue young minds,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m pleased to say that I think there is an entire generation of students all over B.C. who have possibly experienced the initiative. I launched the StirringUpGhosts.ca<\/a> website to that end.\u201d<\/p>\n Gathering items collected over the decades, from rare footage of things like old 16-mm film of the Kettle Valley and B.C. Electric Railway, to the Apple Box Belles, the project presents it all under one banner. With around a dozen accompanying songs, Stirring Up Ghosts dives into categories ranging from the Age of Discovery and the Quest for Gold to Everyday Heroes and more. Coughlan feels that the initiative is his ultimate creative legacy.<\/p>\n Apple Box Belles is the first Tiller\u2019s Folly track to be given a multimedia treatment, with virtual walk-throughs and archival image montages that the band refers to as \u201cSongumentary.\u201d Coughlan says it is a solution to getting a digital generation interested in the past.<\/p>\n \u201cHow do you tell these stories to kids glued to their phone screens is a challenge,\u201d he said. \u201cSo I came up with a new format that is part-documentary\/part-song video that translates well to the realities of today\u2019s media-driven society. It\u2019s an exciting creation.\u201d<\/p>\n Coughlan is quick to add that he doesn\u2019t spend all of his non-performing time exploring dusty archives across B.C.\u2019s vastness to come up with material for Tiller\u2019s Folly songs. A lot of ideas come from fans and friends pointing the songwriter in the right direction.<\/p>\n Last year, while visiting a longtime friend\u2019s museum in Princeton, a volunteer piped up and told Coughlan about her aunt, Aurelia.<\/p>\n \u201cShe was born in the 1890s in the Similkameen and wrote a memoir, which was kindly forwarded to me in a digital copy,\u201d he said. \u201cReading it, I was taken by her observations of going to community dances, being shy and never dancing until a kindly older Southern gent named George Edwards taught her to waltz. That man is better known in history as American robber Billy Miner.\u201d<\/p>\n So Coughlan wrote a waltz about Aurelia coming of age and learning to dance with one of Canada\u2019s most notorious bandits. He says what comes around goes around, too, as he recently was contacted by a team of local historians working on a book about a regional gold rush who wanted to borrow some lines from a Tiller\u2019s Folly song for the text.<\/p>\n The process of documenting provincial history in song is an endless one. But Coughlan\u2019s mantra for making music is \u201cmove it or lose it.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI turn 65 this year and have my legacy of what I want to leave behind \u2014 and that is to have other people enjoy the history of British Columbia as much as I do,\u201d he said. \u201cSo much of it is being swallowed up by ever-expanding global metropolitan urbanization and it needs to be preserved.\u201d<\/p>\n Coughlan, says he knew music was going to be his career when his father took him to see the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre<\/a> in 1966, marks his 50th year as a performing musician this year. In 2024, he was honoured with the International Male Vocalist of the Year award from the International Singer-Songwriter Association<\/a>. This led to Tiller\u2019s Folly being picked up by Lunar Productions, a boutique Canadian agency that handles such heavy-hitters as Susan Aglukark, the Barra MacNeils, Lennie Gallant and others.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re looking forward to what this will bring in 2026 in festivals, theatres, pubs and wherever else will have us,\u201d he said. \u201cI also have a solo show called Confessions of a Serial Songsmith about how music has been an adventure for me and all the fun it has provided.\u201d<\/p>\n sderdeyn@postmedia.com<\/a><\/p>\n Relive some of the biggest concerts to hit local stages over the decades with our Vancouver Rocks! Concert photo album. REGISTER HERE<\/a> to get the free PDF emailed to your inbox.<\/p>\n
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