Ruth Purves Smith “has had a really big life”
• Nicolle Ioanidis
• 11 August 2021
The artist, author, and singer/songwriter has had a boost of creativity during the pandemic, writing and recording a new album, and working on several writing projects.
Her life and musical journey has been woven and intertwined like a rich tapestry, much like the fibres spun at the 1800’s-inspired Custom Wool Mill started by her parents in the 1970’s, now run by her sister. While born and raised in Calgary, Ruth had her feet in both worlds, as both a city girl, and as a horse-wrangler in the foothills and helper at the mill, which is located directly west of Linden.
Ruth received guitar lessons in the fifth grade, using a guitar gifted by her step-mom. The guitar was a Classical Espana which spent its days roaming across the world, around campfires and on horseback journeys with Ruth. It has since been restored by Ruth’s sister and given to her niece. Ruth’s step-mom was delighted to know it was still being enjoyed by her family having long-since thought it had been given to a pawnshop somewhere, Ruth said with a laugh.
After learning the basics, she dabbled with her craft, but was devoted to child-rearing while her kids were young. In 1996 Ruth arrived in Swalwell, settling in the hamlet for good, letting the rural life fuel her song and story. “The community in this part of the country; I’ve never felt so at home my whole life until I moved to Swalwell.”
Not long after moving to Swalwell, while working at the hall as a cleaner, Ruth saw a band setting up for the evening’s fundraiser event. Although she hadn’t performed in a long time, she asked them if she could sing something with them that night. “They agreed”, she recalls, “because they are kind-hearted lovely souls”.
She says “I dolled myself up and got my courage up to go out there and sing for the community, my first time singing in front of the Swalwell community”. The band, and those in the audience, were pleasantly surprised when Ruth sang not “a wedding song or some other silly thing”, but rather a “funked up Ode to Billy Joel”. That band was Dean Ray and Tim Shearlaw, and Ruth would go on to later sing harmonies on Ray’s album.
Ruth got her start in the music business touring the province with her band, with gigs and constant travel in buses and vans with five sets per night, six days per week. It was all “big hair and short skirts” she says, playing covers and classic country songs.
That life would change when she heard the music of Fred Eagle Smith whose songs unlocked Ruth’s creativity, and gave her permission to start writing. She says, “That was 2000. I started writing and never looked back!”
Ruth released her first album in 2010, her second in 2016, and her third has been recorded and is now in the production process, set to be released on April 1, 2022, her late father’s birthday.
Her latest album features all original songs, plus a few co-writes with notable names like Fred Koller, author of Angel Eyes, and Eugene Strickland, a playwright out of Calgary who will contribute spoken word on her album. Ruth also obtained permission to cover a Jonathan Byrd track; he writes for big names like Willie Nelson, so Ruth considers it a big honour. A very special co-write is also the title track of her new album, “Piano in a Field, which she wrote with her sister, and is their version of a true story that happened near Sunnyslope thirty years ago.
Ruth says the story goes that “a woman with a pick-up truck deposited her life, her whole world and everything she ever owned on the side of the dirt-road allowance at the top of the hill near Sunnyslope. All she had was her twelve year old son, truck, and her upright piano. She deposited herself at the side of the road and eventually she lost all her possessions, until one day she was never seen again.” This will be Ruth’s second single and says that her songs are described as post-apocalyptic westerns, with Celtic, blues, rock, and folk influences.
The pandemic has completely upped Smith’s creativity, she says, causing her to dive completely into her art, which has taken many forms, saying “all this creative stuff—I had to do something to not go crazy during the pandemic!”
She and twenty other women have collaborated on a book called “Women of Worth: Women in Business in a Changing World”, sharing their unique stories. It is the ninth book in the Women of Worth series, founded by Christine Awram. Ruth’s section, “Finding My Way in a New Day” is the fourth chapter of the book. Hers is a 2,500 word essay on the twists and turns and change of direction she’s experienced because of the pandemic. The book was released on June 22nd, 2021 and went to #1 in an unprecedented seventeen categories on Amazon, even beating out Will Smith’s autobiography! Ruth says “don’t release a book on the same day as the Canadian girls!”
WOW Founder Christine Awram says, “I’m overwhelmed by what the authors of this book have been able to do, not only as writers, but as human beings, as professionals and leaders. Resources created by women to empower other women couldn’t be more essential right now.”
In addition to the Women of Worth project, Ruth has a children’s book underway which she’s completed with a writing coach out of Airdrie. The book is about a hamster named Clover who has all kinds of adventures, imagining himself as a black bear living in the wild. She credits her illustrator for creating such a memorable character, based on a hamster she owned.
In addition to her writing and recording during the pandemic, Ruth has grown enough tomatoes to sell to the whole hamlet, has discovered Twitch where she hosts livestreams, has begun creating silk and wool felted jackets, initiated Edgar Allan Poe readings, and has hosted free concerts, craft sales, bottle drives, and rummage sales in her front lawn to fund her record project.
Looking back on her life, Ruth says that she “used to think she would travel around like roaming butterflies and moon beams, but reality has a way of setting in.” She says she has “tried really hard to not let the real world make me live in the real world. The real world is hard on artists, making them feel like they aren’t contributing, or don’t have a real job” but that she has “only gratitude and love; I’ve been fortunate.”