The Stratford guitarist and member of the 1950s/1960s Stratford rock band, The Revols, died peacefully in his sleep at home in Stratford Sunday after a long battle with an extended illness.
There are only a handful of old-school Stratford rockers who could say they rubbed shoulders with as many legends and had as much influence on shaping the genre as guitarist John Till.
Till’s bandmates from The Revols, Richard Manuel – who later gained fame with The Band – and Ken Kalmusky of Great Speckled Bird could have made that claim were they still alive today, but Till was one of Stratford’s last living connections to an era of history that helped establish rock and roll as the music of a new generation and set the stage for the evolution of the genre as we know it today.
On Sunday, Till, 78, died in his sleep at home in Stratford after a long battle with an extended illness.
“I had the chance to go over and see him and I knew something was wrong just by the way he was acting,” said Shawn Till, John’s youngest of two sons. “I got him into his bed and everything, got him comfortable, and I had a little chat with him, which was nice, so we were able to close that off. That was one thing he wanted to make sure he did before he went.”
In addition to being a talented musician who helped found The Revols in 1957 with Kalmusky and Manuel while still students at Stratford Central secondary school and went on to play with both Janis Joplin’s Kozmic Blues Band and her Full Tilt Boogie Band, Shawn said his dad was a devoted and supportive father who freely shared his talent and love of music with friends, family and community.
“He was quiet and a little bit reclusive. Because of what his job was – to be out in the public eye – he liked to have his alone time. He really was just a family guy. He wanted to be around his kids and his grandchildren in recent years. It’s hard to process his loss. He was a really great guy, really intelligent and … he was everything to me. Him and I talked on a daily basis. … I’m very, very fortunate to have that relationship.”
Like his own parents, John made sure there was music and musical instruments in their home when Shawn and his older brother, Michael Till, were growing up, but he never pushed them to follow in his footsteps as a musician.
“He was very kind and very caring and he was like that with everyone. If what you were doing wasn’t hurting anyone, he wasn’t going to give you guff for it,” Shawn said. “He never had any sort of ego. That was one thing about him was he would try and stay away from that spotlight. Even in the days of being that big rock star playing with Janis, he’d stay away from that stuff.”
Shawn Till said one of his fondest memories was performing with his dad as part of the band BW Pawley & Plum Loco after Shawn replaced Kalmusky as the band’s bassist when Kalmusky fell ill in the early 2000s.
“For the next 13 years I played alongside my dad. We played every weekend, we played constantly. I mean, what can you say about that? What a special thing to be able to do. We had these different aspects to our relationship. We were father and son, we were best friends and we were also bandmates,” Shawn said.
Though it hadn’t been announced officially by the family, news of John’s death spread quickly over social media Monday, with longtime friends, neighbors and members of the Stratford community sharing their condolences with his family.
Speaking with the Beacon Herald Tuesday, Bob Kalmusky, Ken Kalmusky’s brother, said his family and the Tills had remained friends for his entire life. When he was young, the Kalmusky family’s basement became the official clubhouse for The Revols, where friends of the band hung out and listened as John, Manuel and Ken rehearsed.
“John would call me, oh, about once a month,” Bob said. “I knew how sick he was, but I didn’t realize his passing was as soon as it happened, so I was shocked. John was a great person; very kind, soft spoken, very thoughtful and very, very talented. …I’ll really miss his humor. He was a really well-spoken and smart person, (and) he always told a lot of stories about different things we did together. I’m just really going to miss having him as a good friend.”
Kathryn Manuel, Richard Manuel’s sister-in-law through her late husband, Donald Manuel, also told the Beacon Herald Tuesday how much she valued her friendships with John and Dorcas Till over the years. Kathryn said she grew up with John – his parents and her dad were well-known musicians in Stratford in the ’40s and ’50s – and their families remained close, often vacationing together at their shared cottage in Sauble Beach.
“It’s sort of the end of an era with John and Richard and Ken,” Kathryn said. “They all did so very well as Stratford people. (John) was just always welcoming, always willing to help you, always giving our kids little pieces of technology to take home, and always interested in the world and people around him.”