By Jay Scott Kanes

HUNTER RIVER, PEI, Canada – Like most musicians, singer/songwriter Kris Taylor dreams of performing well enough to “own the stage”. With a splash of inspiration and buckets of perspiration, he made it happen.

Amazingly, Kris, a part-time pharmacist in Hunter River, a tiny community in Prince Edward Island, Canada’s smallest province, achieved this musical milestone not with his guitar, but by swinging a hammer and surfing the Internet.

As the Hunter River United Church moved into a new building, 34-year-old Kris and wife Melanie, who live nearby in New Glasgow, decided to buy the old church. In a year of extensive renovations, the Taylors transformed the place, built in 1846, into Harmony House, a 140-seat, air-conditioned theatre and concert hall. This new venue has a top-flight sound-and-lighting system, a large screen and movie projector, sloped theatre seating, a lobby and a concession stand complete with a popcorn machine.

“This is satisfying,” Kris said. “When touring, I never feel like the sound is the way I want it. Or I’m stuck in someone else’s closet as a dressing room. Or I’m lugging gear. Here, I’ve tried to correct all the things that ever went wrong on the road.

“We’d love for Harmony House to become a place that musicians and patrons think of and say: ‘When we’re on PEI, we’re going to Harmony House.’ Big acts go to some small venues because they enjoy being there.”

Kris invested lots of “sweat equity”, but the reconstruction project was a team effort. Melanie helped, as did their four young children (Mikaela, Jenna, Jacquelyn and Michael), relatives, friends and a few hired contractors.

Some raw materials came from surprising places. Using the Internet, Kris bought the comfy seats from a New York courthouse. A friend who trucks spuds to New England fetched them. Douglas-fir beams came from an old airplane hanger. Red bricks from old chimneys went into the interior walls.

“On eBay, we bought probably enough curtain material to cover Hunter River, and then my mother made the theatre curtains,” Kris said. “We got the projector, sound equipment and a lot more on eBay too. It’s a salvager’s paradise.” Bargains on the Internet slashed the renovation costs by 15-20 per cent.

Harmony House opened in 2008. As fitting for a musician who “owns the stage”, Kris used the opening night to launch Better Left Said, his latest CD (which then won a PEI Music Award as pop recording of the year).

“Playing to open the theatre was a real joy,” Kris said. “The sound was good. I felt comfortable. I had the right mikes for my guitar. If all those things fall into line, then performing is fun.”

Everyone attending the double-launch party (for the theatre and the CD) received the 10-track CD as part of the admission price. Recorded in New York, the folk-style CD had Doug Derryberry, a guitarist for Bruce Hornsby, as its producer.

Now Grandpa, he liked old George Jones,
Gingersnaps and chicken bones.
And he taught me about sticks and stones.
And that names would never hurt me….
Then we buried him in his suit and hat
Down by the station where he bought his gas.
And history will say that he has gone away.
And the photographs won’t bring him back.
But he lasts….
From “He Lasts”, Kris Taylor, Better Left Said, 2008

By now, the bright-orange Harmony House, conspicuous beside a busy road, has hosted concerts by the likes of Brenda Stubbert, Mollie Rankin, Catherine MacLellan, Mike Pendergast, Richard Wood, Matt Minglewood, Gary Fjellgaard and J.P. Cormier. There are movie nights and plans for plays too.

Melanie handles bookings. “If this place succeeds, it’ll be because it’s neat and built differently, but mostly because Melanie fosters relationships and makes things happen,” Kris said.

Kris believes in crafting the best songs possible, filling them with thought-provoking lyrics and singing with conviction, as on his three CDs. Before Better Left Said, he released The Bigger Blue (1998) and Nake (2004). He has toured with multiple-ECMA winner Bruce Guthro and starred at the Festival of Lights in Charlottetown. His voice attracts comparisons to Bob Dylan and David Gray.

Now I can be strong,
Sometimes overly so.
But I never needed anything
Like I needed you to know,
I may get over the moon
Before I get over you.
From “Over the Moon”, Kris Taylor, Nake, 2004

“Once I write the songs and perform them solo, they come across as very folk-flavored, and I’m cool with that,” Kris said. He prefers his own material and rarely plays cover songs. “I do like cover tunes, but there’s nothing worse than when the audience goes nuts as you play someone else’s song. That insults your career.”

As children, brothers Kris, Brett and Craig spent much of their time at golf. Brett and Craig later played as professionals.

“But music always was something I loved and wanted to do,” Kris said. Listening repeatedly to favorite albums, like Bruce Springsteen’s Born in the USA, Neil Diamond’s Hot August Nights or Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel’s Bridge Over Troubled Water, defined parts of his childhood. “I’d get obsessed with them.

“But at first, I had no musical instrument. At age 14, I went from golf to road-race cycling. For seven years, I raced competitively. For a few years, I ranked among Canada’s top few junior racers. At the Canada Games, I finished fourth. But it got to be too much. With that lifestyle, you’re on the bike more than 30 hours a week. You’re either eating or riding. It lacked the fervor I’d expected.

“At age 21, I began to play guitar. Once I got to university and the music flowed there, I played in bars and started to write songs. That’s where it all started.”

After studying pharmacy, Kris joined the drug store that his father ran for decades. He works there 25-30 hours per week.

A year after graduating, he issued a CD. “I felt mature about the songwriting, but my musical ability remained green,” he said.

In 2001, 26-year-old Kris went to New York, heard new musical influences, widened his perspective and vowed to improve on guitar and piano. “For a few years after I came home, no one heard of me,” he said. “I took jazz lessons, got as proficient on the guitar as I could and listened to lots of different music.”

Then six songs recorded on a return trip to New York gave a firm foundation for his second album. “We had Cyndi Lauper’s musicians on the Nake album. It was produced very well. But I always think the music onstage is more genuine and sincere.

“On the latest album, Better Left Said, I steered the boat,” Kris said. “I wanted it to be honest and sincere, and the songwriting’s stronger than ever.”

But maybe I’m just not as tough as leather,
Trying to make it out here on my own,
Cause there’s fights and floods,
And floors with blood and burrs,
And pills and pressure.
So maybe I’m better off at home….
From “Tough As Leather”, Kris Taylor, Better Left Said, 2008

Ironically, Kris met Melanie through pharmacy, not music. She worked in public relations for a drug company.

Before tackling Harmony House, Kris built his family’s home. “I wanted to be able to play music,” he said. “If I’d gotten someone else to build it, I’d have been stuck in the pharmacy to pay for it. So I built it myself. It’s all part of the funny way my life’s built around the music business.”

Along the way, Kris may need time to nurture new Taylor musicians. “If you gave my daughter Mikaela a few days with any instrument, I believe she’d master it,” Kris said.

Multi-talented Kris, a dedicated musician, pharmacist, renovator and family man, isn’t a typical guy. “It’s been a long road,” he said. “Now there’s satisfaction that I don’t feel a need to beat my head against the wall trying for everyone else’s approval.

“Music has medicinal value. For many people, it holds spiritual value too. For me, songwriting and music became spiritual experiences early. Once that happens, you never escape from them. Thankfully, something always comes along in music to lift you up.”

Kris still writes songs at every opportunity. “Definitely, there’ll be more CDs. Maybe my producer will come here and we’ll do a live album at Harmony House.”

For more information: www.harmonyhousetheatre.com


Creating Harmony House means removing
some hints of the building's religious past.



'You'd like how many tickets?' Kris takes
a call at Harmony House's reception desk.

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