Susan Jacks

Susan Jacks, née Pesklevits, went through several different career stages. Early on, she performed solo, appearing on Music Hop, a CBC-TV production where she met <a href="spotify:artist:09dDdtfi4mWLdC2BHOrIrl">Terry Jacks</a>, the man she would later wed. <a href="spotify:artist:5YCa2ZsNL86M1fLHW8bElw">Jacks</a> later telephoned her future spouse when she needed a guitarist to back her at a gig where she was scheduled to sing. <a href="spotify:artist:09dDdtfi4mWLdC2BHOrIrl">Terry Jacks</a>' group, the Chessmen, had already disbanded and so he agreed to fill in. From there the pair formed a duo and started to perform at small nightspots. Another career shift brought <a href="spotify:artist:5YCa2ZsNL86M1fLHW8bElw">Jacks</a> and her husband into a group setting, where they would join with Satwant Singh, a tabla player, and Craig McCaw, a guitarist, to form <a href="spotify:artist:0XawOhZ28ajmIWwPpRJuDA">the Poppy Family</a>.

The group earned international recognition with "Which Way You Goin' Billy?" In 1969, the single earned four Juno Awards. <a href="spotify:artist:09dDdtfi4mWLdC2BHOrIrl">Terry Jacks</a>, who had an aversion to live performances, downsized <a href="spotify:artist:0XawOhZ28ajmIWwPpRJuDA">the Poppy Family</a> the following year by dismissing <a href="spotify:artist:30Y7JOpiNgAGEhnkYPdI1P">Singh</a> and McCaw. Still using the name <a href="spotify:artist:0XawOhZ28ajmIWwPpRJuDA">the Poppy Family</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:5YCa2ZsNL86M1fLHW8bElw">Jacks</a> and her husband scored on the charts with "Where Evil Grows" and "That's Where I Went Wrong." The band brought another guitarist onboard for live gigs that they were pressured to make and for studio recordings. By 1973, Susan and <a href="spotify:artist:09dDdtfi4mWLdC2BHOrIrl">Terry Jacks</a> had each gone solo. Susan released an eponymous album that same year. Her husband acted as producer for the recording, which spawned "I Want You to Love Me" and "I Thought of You Again." The latter song was written by her husband and received a nomination for a Juno Award. That same year, she ended the marriage. She put together a backing band that she dubbed Cheese and went on tour. The singles "Tall Dark Stranger," "Anna Marie," and "All the Tea in China" helped earn her another Juno nomination.

In 1975, <a href="spotify:artist:5YCa2ZsNL86M1fLHW8bElw">Jacks</a> worked on her next album, Dreams, but it was kept from market by Ray Pettinger, her husband's former business associate at <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Goldfish+Records%22">Goldfish Records</a>. Pettinger christened the label <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Casino+Records%22">Casino Records</a> after he purchased <a href="spotify:artist:09dDdtfi4mWLdC2BHOrIrl">Terry Jacks</a>' interest in the business. Susan Jacks filed a lawsuit against Pettinger for using her funds to finance the buyout. She won her lawsuit, but at the cost of her Dreams album and several years of downtime for her career. By 1980, however, she was back and recording for <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22CBS%22">CBS</a>, which put out her Ghosts album. Once again, <a href="spotify:artist:09dDdtfi4mWLdC2BHOrIrl">Terry Jacks</a> acted as her producer. She put out Forever two years later, with producer Tom Lavin.

By 1983, <a href="spotify:artist:5YCa2ZsNL86M1fLHW8bElw">Jacks</a> had remarried (to Ted Dushinski of the Canadian Football League), and landed a new record deal in Nashville, where she relocated that year. The album Tall Dark Stranger came out the following year and snagged another Juno nomination. Trouble sprouted within a few years, however, when her new label went belly up. <a href="spotify:artist:5YCa2ZsNL86M1fLHW8bElw">Jacks</a> concentrated on songwriting rather than singing for about five years. She spent time in a managerial position at a music publishing business and later rose to the position of vice-president at a consulting company.

In 2004, <a href="spotify:artist:5YCa2ZsNL86M1fLHW8bElw">Jacks</a> and Dushinski left Nashville to return to Canada after he had been diagnosed with lung cancer. The disease claimed his life in October 2005, and not long after his death, <a href="spotify:artist:5YCa2ZsNL86M1fLHW8bElw">Jacks</a> was diagnosed with kidney failure. She received a kidney transplant in 2010 (her brother was the organ donor), and when she returned to performing in 2011, she often appeared at fund-raising events to raise money and awareness for organ donation. <a href="spotify:artist:5YCa2ZsNL86M1fLHW8bElw">Jacks</a> would continue to struggle with kidney disease on and off for the rest of her life, and she was in line for a second transplant when she died in Surrey, British Columbia on April 25, 2022. She was 73 years old. ~ Linda Seida, Rovi