Canadian slide guitarist Ellen McIlwaine is a music legend you probably never heard of

CBC

17-03-2025

Singer, songwriter and slide guitarist Ellen McIlwaine should have been a household name. She played with the likes of Jimi Hendrix and Taj Mahal. Internationally renowned DJs like Fatboy Slim sampled her sound. Yet, her story is largely forgotten.
Meet singer, songwriter and slide guitarist Ellen McIlwaine | Goddess of Slide
20 days ago
Duration 3:18
An original documentary from documentary Channel, Goddess of Slide: The Forgotten Story of Ellen McIlwaine, offers an intimate look at McIlwaine's journey from humble beginnings as a child adopted by missionary parents to a powerhouse on the stage.
Born in Nashville, Tennessee, McIlwaine moved to Japan at the age of two with her adoptive parents. It made for a unique multicultural upbringing, particularly for someone growing up in the 1950s and '60s. Ellen played piano for her father's Presbyterian Church and listened to international music on the family's radio box.
In 1963, the McIlwaine family moved back to the United States. Her parents enrolled McIlwaine in an ultra-religious college in Bristol, Tennessee. She did not last there.
"My father sent me to this little tiny religious college in Bristol, Tennessee. I think he was trying to keep me safe. There were no cars on campus, no dancing, no holding hands, no public display of affection, no smoking… for the girls. The boys could smoke anywhere they wanted; the girls could only smoke in their rooms. And so I broke the rule," McIlwaine muses.
When Ellen discovered the guitar, she soon began to play in coffee houses and finally dropped out of college to pursue her dream of being a musician in New York City.
"One of the girls in the dorm had a guitar. And so I went up to the top, there was like a really echoey attic part of the dorm, and I played the guitar and I sang and I thought that's it, I want to play music!" McIlwaine continues.
Eight months after arriving in New York, McIlwaine was already a fixture in the Greenwich Village music scene. She opened for some of the biggest blues legends in the world, like Odetta, Richie Havens, and Mississippi John Hurt.
Then, something extraordinary happened. An artist named Jimi Hendrix approached McIlwaine after one of her sets at the infamous Cafe Au GoGo to ask if he could sit in with her on stage. For six magical nights, McIlwaine and Hendrix ignited the stage together.
Singer Ellen MciLwaine talks about her childhood | Goddess of Slide
20 days ago
Duration 0:30
"I poked my head in one room and there was this woman on stage. She started playing and it just radiated from the center of the universe. I mean, the centre of your soul. It doesn't get any better than that," explains American blues musician Taj Mahal on first seeing McIlwaine perform.
McIlwaine's voice was powerful, her stage presence was captivating and she was doing what no other woman in the 1960s was doing: playing the slide guitar.
A style of guitar playing that involves holding a hard object – the slide – against the strings was something only guys did when McIlwaine entered the music scene. She did not get the memo.
"I watched Randy California take a string and soak it in lighter fluid and blow the neck off a wine bottle and play bottleneck guitar, and I thought, I could do that! Nobody taught me anything, I just kind of banged around on it and came up with my stuff," McIlwaine explains.
McIlwaine made her way to Woodstock, where she became the lead singer and slide guitarist of the psychedelic band, Fear Itself. Their 1968 self-titled album was produced by legendary music producer Tom Wilson (Bob Dylan, The Velvet Underground). Although the album was well-received by critics and music lovers, the band felt unsupported by their label. Their producers wanted the band to change the roster, their style and their setting (East Coast for California). Frustrated, McIlwaine went her separate way.
Soon after, she signed a three-record deal with Polydor Records. Things were looking up. In a few short years she released two solo albums – Honky Tonk Angel in 1972 and We The People the following year – and contributed to the now classic 1974 double-compilation album from Polydor, The Guitar Album. The record featured greats like Eric Clapton, Roy Buchanan, Rory Gallagher, T-Bone Walker, and Link Wray. Ellen was the only female guitarist on the album.
At Carnegie Hall in New York City in 1973, while opening for American funk band Mandrill, McIlwaine had a breakthrough. Here, Ellen performed and recorded her live signature protest song, "We The People", dedicated to the Lakota Massacre at Wounded Knee. This song elevated Ellen to cult status as she demonstrated her powerful skills as a slide guitarist. And her unique scat singing – in Japanese – blew audiences away.
Fans talk about how McIlwaine was a powerhouse performer on stage.
While critics and peers alike adored McIlwaine, the record industry was not as kind. Creative differences and contractual disputes led to the cancellation of a promised third album with Polydor Records. This was a huge blow to her career.
Ellen may have experienced Canadian culture at the Canadian Academy International School in Kobe in the 1950s, but her love affair with Canada began in earnest in Montreal. She recorded her album, The Real Ellen McIlwaine, in 1975 with the Ville Emard Blues Band at Studio Six.
At the time, things seemed destined to change. Her performances at the Montreal International Jazz Festival and her first international tour in Australia in the early 1980s secured her status as a true musician for almost a decade. Her album Everybody Needs It, recorded in 1982 in Chicago with longtime friend and legendary singer and bass player Jack Bruce of Cream, garnered awards and accolades.
But McIlwaine was a functional alcoholic, and inevitably the pressure got to be too much. Her self-esteem was at an all-time low, and gigs were not materialising. McIlwaine was broke and in bad shape. Luckily, a close friend who had just gotten herself sober convinced her to attend an AA meeting. McIlwaine never drank again.
Constantly moving from one city to another, McIlwaine became a Canadian citizen in 1987. Her sense of belonging to a new country allowed her to pursue her career on her own terms. She remained on the margins, but she felt accepted and immersed herself wholeheartedly in the Toronto music scene. She even made an appearance on MuchMusic in 1987 to promote her new music video. She would eventually settle in Calgary in 1992.
McIlwaine's talents began to be noticed by a new brand of musicians in the 1990s – the DJs.
In 1998, British sensation Fatboy Slim incorporated McIlwaine's powerful guitar riffs from her cover of Stevie Wonder's "Higher Ground" into his song "Song For Lindy."
In 2001, Japan's Mondo Grosso invited McIlwaine to write and sing on their single, "Don't Let Go." Japanese DJs Kenichi Yanai and Kei Kobayashi were so enamored by McIlwaine's sound that they invited her to tour with them in Japan.
But by the mid-2000s, now in her 60s, McIlwaine's career was on the decline. As the years passed she received fewer invites to perform on the folk and jazz festival circuit. Royalties from previous album recordings were non-existent and there were no new recordings on the horizon.
In 2009, McIlwaine took a job as a bus driver for a private girls' school in Calgary. She barely earned enough money to live.
Just before McIlwaine died of cancer in June of 2021, the documentary film about her life had just gotten the green light. There was talk of travelling for the filming and even getting back on the stage. Those plans never came to fruition.
Instead, the producers behind Goddess of Slide were determined to make this film now more than ever. The film became an homage to a slide guitar pioneer who helped pave the way for the next generation of female musicians. The film's participants eagerly agreed to sit down for an interview to gush over a spirited and talented musician, songwriter and singer who deserved more respect from the music industry…and a spot in the music history books.