Tim Godfrey, MBA ’79, is taking his one-man show on tour, playing for Ontario seniors who share his love of music and make him feel like the rock star he once wanted to be.
My guitar dominated my career thoughts as an Ivey student in the late 1970s, when my favourite band was Steely Dan. Simply put, studying business was a back-up plan. For all the reasons that a young man seeks fame and fortune, I passionately wanted to be a rock star.
Remember Rikki Don’t Lose That Number? Well, I never did lose my passion for music, but stardom was my Rikki, and we never did hook up. In fact, my early musical career never advanced much beyond entertaining classmates at The Spoke, and a one-nighter at a folk café in Calgary. However, my MBA led me to a satisfying career as an investment advisor.
Over the years, I kept the dream alive, playing charity galas, birthday parties and street festivals with my band Timmy and the Jets. But demand for dance bands eventually dried up. It was fun, but I never did achieve superstar status—at least not until last year when I started a tour far more rewarding than anything I imagined as a young man.
Today, at 64, I’m a full-time investment advisor at Richardson GMP, but I am also now playing regular gigs across Ontario for an audience that asks for my autograph and has even created demand for my music on CD. My fans are a bit older than I imagined when I first started dreaming about a musical career. After all, I don’t rock out at places like the Air Canada Centre. I play more intimate venues—retirement residences.
My mother-in-law, Marion Mills, deserves credit for my solo career, which started after I sat down at a piano and sang a few songs during a visit to her home at Revera’s Windermere on the Mount in London. That impromptu concert led me to some gigs at other retirement residences near my home in the Greater Toronto Area, including Amica’s beautiful Balmoral Club in Toronto. The rest is history.
Research shows that listening to music is excellent therapy for people suffering from Alzheimer’s disease and dementia. But that’s just a bonus. The seniors love getting down and funky with Motown hits like How Sweet It Is (to Be Loved by You). In fact, it makes me feel great after the show when one of my wonderful fans thanks me for singing a favourite song, often with tears in her eyes.
Over the next few years, I plan to keep my tour going part-time. But I suspect my dream of being a rock star just became my retirement plan.
Photo: Nation Wong
Art Direction: Greg Salmela, Aegis
