In My Own Key

My Life in Love and Music
From down-and-out years in Paris, to her romance with Canada’s prime minister Pierre Trudeau, to stages around the world, Liona Boyd has made a lifestyle of crossing boundaries, both musically and romantically. Whether with classical greats or folk legends like Gordon Lightfoot, she has always made music — and lived her life — in her own key.
Exotic venues, sold-out concerts, and the companionship of the world’s most powerful people have given Liona Boyd a lifestyle that, like her music, is one in a million.

Exotic venues, sold-out concerts, and the companionship of the world’s most powerful people have given Liona Boyd a lifestyle that, like her music, is one in a million. The internationally acclaimed classical guitarist has crossed numerous boundaries, both musically and romantically.

In this colourful memoir covering her life up to 1998, she serves up a rich and fascinating mix: childhood with her progressive parents in England, Canada, and Mexico, exacting music studies in Toronto, down-and-out years in London and Paris, her eight-year romance with Canadian prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, drug experimentation in a Mexican artists’ colony, and whirlwind trips around the globe to eminent concert stages.

It all makes for a rousing, feisty, passionate tale, as compelling and entrancing as the music of her Ramírez guitar.