All of Me by Anne Murray

Author:Anne Murray [Murray, Anne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-37309-0
Publisher: Knopf Canada
Published: 2009-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

ONE DAY IN 1977, Lyman took a call from a friend who worked at the Bank of Commerce, as the CIBC was then known. Would I be interested in becoming its celebrity spokeswoman? Lyman later presented the proposal at one of our regular Balmur meetings. I would have full creative control over the ads and a veto over the images used. I had never been keen about these overtures. In fact I had turned down almost every such offer that came my way and had publicly criticized other celebrities who attached their name to products of one sort or another.

But there were obvious cracks in my position. As early as April 1971 I had agreed to sing in a short film to be shown to General Motors dealers. They paid me $6,500 and gave me something I considered just as valuable at the time: the use of a sporty new Corvette convertible for a year. In 1975 I had recorded vocals for four commercials for Eastman Kodak. And after my tour of Japan in 1977, I’d been invited to sing on a Japanese-language ad for Trident sugarless gum, which they apparently played thirty times a day.

With the Commerce, Lyman and Leonard argued that I’d be endorsing an institution, not a product per se, and one whose services I had personally used since I opened my first bank account in Springhill at fifteen. And the fee, for the number of days required, was hard to ignore. And so from 1978 to 1984 I shot commercials in locations across the country, a commitment of about two weeks each year. I took some heat for this decision; the accusations flew that I had somehow sold out and was acting hypocritically. In retrospect, perhaps that’s true. Looking back on them now, those ads do leave me with a certain unease. The contract also contributed to my over-exposure in Canada, so it might not have been the smartest career move. At the time, however, I didn’t view it as selling out. Virtually every adult Canadian had a bank account, so I wasn’t pitching something people didn’t need or use. And the extra income dramatically reduced the number of days I’d have to spend on the concert circuit, giving me more time for priority number one, my family. That, for me, was the compelling argument. And the campaign worked for the bank, significantly increasing its recognition factor among Canadians.

At the initial signing ceremony the bank presented the document for me to sign. “Just a minute,” said Lyman. “I haven’t yet had a chance to read it.” The bankers weren’t very happy at having their integrity implicitly impugned, but I signed only after Lyman had verified that all the provisions were exactly as had been agreed.

I did the commercials for six years. Every few years, bank chairman and CEO Russell Harrison would invite Lyman, Leonard and me to lunch with him and other senior bank executives in their fifty-sixth floor aerie high above Toronto’s Bay Street. These

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