Music Express : The Rise, Fall, & Resurrection of Canada's Music Magazine

The glory days of rock from the perspective of Canada’s original music magazine.

The story of Music Express is told through the unique perspective of Keith Sharp, the magazine’s founder and editor. During its seventeen-year existence, Music Express rose from a small, Calgary-based regional magazine to an international publication. The interviews, anecdotes, and stories cover the golden era of Canadian music, with the rise to global status of such icons as Bryan Adams, Loverboy, Rush, Celine Dion, and Triumph. Their stories, as well as many more, are captured together with an array of classic rock photography that provides a unique time capsule.  

       From Sharp’s Calgary roots in 1976 to the heady heights of his publication’s growth, he details foreign adventures covering the likes of David Bowie in Australia, KISS in West Germany, and Iron Maiden in Poland, along with other high-profile interviews including U2, Paul McCartney, Iron Maiden, and Rod Stewart.

Keith Sharp is a former sportswriter for the Calgary Herald who launched Alberta Music Express as a hobby in July 1976, going full-time with Music Express in 1978. Sharp also launched Access Magazine in June 1995. The native of Manchester, England, runs themusicexpress.ca and lives in Toronto.