Inside Morristown, NJ's MPAC auditorium this Wednesday, March 12, 2025 evening, American women and American men ready themselves for a 60th Anniversary Hits concert by singer Burton Cummings, the voice of the Canadian rock group, The Guess Who.
Cummings was born and raised in Winnipeg, Manitoba and dropped out of high school at 17 to pursue a career in music. He joined a local R&B band, The Deverons, as a singer and pianist. At the age of 18, Cummings joined Chad Allen and the Expressions where he shared vocal chores with leader Chad Allen. After a successful record company marketing ploy where the group’s 1965 single, “Shakin’ All Over,” was released under a pseudonym, the group adopted the nickname “Guess Who?”
A few months later, Allen departed the band and Cummings became the primary singer. At that time, the combo changed its name to “The Guess Who” and Cummings and guitarist Randy Bachman became the group’s main songwriters. The 1970 release of the album, American Woman, made The Guess Who international stars when the title song, “American Woman,” became the first U.S. #1 single ever recorded by a Canadian band.
After a successful run, Cummings left The Guess Who and went on to enjoy a lengthy solo career. Today, he’s considered one of the most influential performers in Canadian music history.
Inside the MPAC auditorium, the lights dim and guitarist Joe Augello, vocalist/percussionist Nick Sinopoli, drummer Sean Fitzsimons, bassist Jeff Jones, and guitarist Tim Bovaconte take the stage and begin to play the intro to The Guess Who’s “Bus Rider.” Burton Cummings enters, takes a seat at the keyboard, and counts, “1, 2, 3, 4,” before singing, “Get up in the morning, get on the bus/Get up in the morning like the rest of us,” while hammering out straight eighths on the piano on this hard rocking boogie number.
The crowd cheers and Cummings replies, “Thank you so very much, folks! I must say right off the bat that we are thrilled to be back playing in the United States again,” before mentioning that after appearing on TV’s Midnight Special in the early ’70s, he got to become “pretty good friends” with the show’s host, Wolfman Jack. Here, he and the band launch into The Guess Who’s “Clap for the Wolfman,” an electrified two-step which features Cummings’ countrified voice, Tim Bovaconte’s twangy electric guitar, and audience members clapping in time to the rhythm before Cummings ends the performance with an animated howl.
Cummings announces, “We do love to sing those songs that you’ve heard on the radio and, my goodness, here comes one of those radio songs now,” as he and the band sail into The Guess Who’s “Hand Me Down World.” Lights flash as Cummings cries, “Don’t give me no hand me down shoes/Don’t give me no hand me down love,” on this straight-ahead rocker which ends with Cummings vocally improvising on the coda.
Cummings reveals, “We’re gonna do a song from the very early stages — way back in the 1960s,” adding, “We got a gold record for it from Dick Clark himself on American Bandstand,” prior to singing, “You took me by surprise/I didn’t realize,” on the melodic Guess Who power ballad, “Laughing.”
Holding up a flute, Cummings says, “Look what I have in my hands,” suggesting, “I’m not really adept at the flute — Ian Anderson has nothing to worry about!” Introducing his next song, Cummings, 77, confesses, “This vocal is tough when you get to my age,” joking, “I’m almost 50!” Here, he launches into the Randy Bachman composed “Undun” where he breathily sings the “She’s come undone/She didn’t know what she was headed for/And when I found what she was headed for/It was too late” lyric and renders a bluesy flute solo on this appealing Latin-influenced pop tune.
Music lovers stand and cheer and Cummings introduces his fellow musicians. He dedicates his next selection to a friend in the audience, Canadian composer Jim Vallance, known for songs like Heart’s “What About Love” and Bryan Adams’ “Heaven.” Concertgoers happily sing along on “Trouble in the City” before Joe Augello and Tim Bovaconte take turns shredding guitar solos on this backbeat rocker by J.J. Cale.
Cummings recalls, “I was still living at home with my mother and grandmother in North Winnipeg when Randy Bachman came over one Saturday morning with his acoustic guitar and we sat at my mother’s piano and wrote this next song. It took about an hour but it changed our lives.” Here, he and the band perform The Guess Who’s 1969 Top Ten hit, “These Eyes.” After opening with his trademark rhythmic electric piano part, Cummings sings, “These eyes/Cry every night for you” before stretching to reach the “These eyes have seen a lot of love but they’re never gonna see another one like I had with you” refrain on this popular ballad.
Fans stand and cheer and Cummings responds, “Thank you very much!” before he and the band heat up the stage with “Blackjack Fever,” a 12/8 R&B boogie track from his newest album, A Few Good Moments. Cummings asks, “Nicky, you feel like singing one?” and percussionist Sinopoli replies, “Yeah!” as the pair pull the trigger and sing together on the funky Guess Who R&B tune, “Guns, Guns, Guns,” where Augello and Bovaconte try to outdo each other playing higher and higher on their guitars.
Cummings introduces what he refers to as “a very sad song” about losing a girlfriend prior to joking, “I got a gold record for it, so it wasn’t a total loss.” On his 1976 international solo hit, “Stand Tall,” Cummings sounds strong in his upper register as he sings, “Stand tall, don’t you fall/ I say don’t go and do something foolish,” accompanied by the strumming of Augello’s acoustic guitar and a lyrical Tim Bovaconte electric guitar solo on this power ballad.
After asking, “You like rock and roll in this part of the country, don’t you?” Cummings swings into his straight-ahead solo rocker, “Your Backyard.” Warning, “If you’re really wonderin’ what I’m doin’ in your backyard/Come on out later, babe, I’ll show you by the light of the moon,” he follows up with a lively honky-tonk piano solo.
The crowd cheers and Cummings relates, “My mother forced me to take classical piano lessons — and I can prove it!” as he renders a snippet of Ludwig Von Beethoven’s “Für Elise” on the keyboard. Conceding, “But I was always more interested in the rock and roll that was on the radio,” Cummings throttles into his own rendition of The Doors’ “Roadhouse Blues” where he impresses on the harmonica before shifting into the bluesy intro to “American Woman” where he instructs the audience to “Spell it with me: A-M-E-R-I-C-A-N!”
The iconic guitar riff which introduces “American Woman” resounds throughout the MPAC auditorium as Cummings sings with authority, “American woman/Get away from me,” on the 1970 Guess Who chart-topper. Joe Augello uses a hand-over-hand touch technique on his guitar’s fingerboard to wail out a distorted solo while Cummings rhythmically strikes Sean Fitzsimons’ cymbal with a tambourine under flashing red, white, and blue lights.
The crowd stands and cheers and Cummings responds, “Thank you! This next song reminds me of the old Doublemint gum commercial because it’s ‘Two, two, two songs in one.’” Here, he and the band start off with The Guess Who’s “No Sugar Tonight,” where Augello strums his acoustic guitar and the audience joyfully claps along, before seamlessly segueing into “New Mother Nature,” where Cummings sings, “It’s the new Mother Nature taking over/She’s gettin’ us all,” on this energetic Southern rocker.
Music lovers stand and dance as Cummings plays electric guitar on The Guess Who’s 1969 million-seller “No Time” where Burton and the group sing, “(No time left for you) On my way to better things/(No time left for you) I found myself some wings.” Tim Bovaconte rocks out on electric guitar as Augello, Sinopoli, Cummings, and Jones line up to play behind him and the crowd enthusiastically cheers when the group exits the stage.
Returning, Cummings exclaims, “Folks, you’ve been terrific to us! Thank you for everything!” prior to introducing “a song I wrote in my hippie days.” After adding, “It’s nice to be playing our old songs here in the United States — I want to wish everyone here a long life, good health, happiness, friendship, success, love, and peace,” Cummings concludes tonight’s performance with “Share the Land.” On this dynamic country rocker, Burton sings, “Maybe I’ll be there to shake your hand/Maybe I’ll be there to share the land,” before he and the band take a well-deserved bow in front of the standing and cheering crowd.
To learn more about Burton Cummings, please go to burtoncummings.com. For information on upcoming concerts at MPAC — including Experience Hendrix with Kenny Wayne Shepard, Devon Allman, Samantha Fish, and more on April 2; Old Crow Medicine Show on April 23; and Dave Mason’s Traffic Jam on August 13 — please click on mayoarts.org.
PHOTO NOTE: The cover photo for this story was captured at a previous stop on Burton Cummings’ 60th Anniversary Hits tour and not taken during the reviewed performance.
PHOTO CREDIT: Photo by Stephanie Siau, taken at Ryman Auditorium, Nashville, TN, February 2, 2025
