What is 'recitation?' Newfoundland tradition-keeper returns to stage from 100-day cancer-treatment isolation

Dave Penny, left, and Daunt Lee, right, practice a song in a downtown St. John's house before a concert on Nov. 7, 2024. (Garrett Barry, CTV National News)

On Thursday morning, Dave Penny officially ended a suggested hundred-day isolation period that followed his diagnosis and stem cell treatment for non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma.

On Thursday night, Penny returned to a stage at a downtown St. John’s bar, regaling a small crowd with songs and stories with a distinctive Newfoundland flair.

The musician has mounted a comeback, more than a year after a cancer diagnosis derailed his career as a distinctive Newfoundland storyteller.

“All guns blazing,” he said before the show on Thursday. “Can’t wait.”

Penny is one of the few public performers of recitations, a Newfoundland tradition — stretching back as far as anyone can remember — that blends song and poetry and storytelling.

“It’s not a commercial thing,” he said. “It’s something that you would do at parties. … It’s not a moneymaker, I can attest to that.”

It’s a mix of Irish, English and European influence that arrived with European settlement. Decades of isolation in small, cut-off communities gave it a distinctive local flair.

Recitations are humorous — often a witty and satirical take on fictional or historical event — but almost never cruel.

“It’s often about a misfortune,” Penny said. “It wouldn’t be a tribute to a flower or something like that. It might be a person who likes the flower so much, they buy a house full of them and is allergic.”

There are a few famous recitation-tellers in the province, and Penny is quickly rising the ranks. He’s written about some of the province’s most remarkable local stories: A massive snowstorm that sparked a state of emergency, or a massive lottery that drew thousands of people to the Goulds neighbourhood of St. John’s.

“He’s kind-hearted, he’s clever and witty and snappy and fast,” said Daunt Lee, Penny’s self-described side-man. “It’s always with a kindness that goes along with it.”

Penny’s cancer diagnosis came suddenly: A few suppressed symptoms that he didn’t recognize, a COVID-19 diagnosis, then a flurry of tests, treatments and check-ins.

Two weeks had passed since his last pre-cancer concert, on Aug. 30. 2023, and a trip to the ICU. Penny received a stem cell transplant, which was followed by a hundred day suggested isolation period.

“It was rotten,” he said.

But it’s over now: “I’m getting my hair back. I can go out in public. Life is good,” he said.

Recitation isn’t the most popular medium — but Penny says it’s not a dying art. He thinks there’s a comeback in the works, with storytelling festivals, recordings and more workshops than ever before.

“Maybe it’s on the upswing,” he said. “A couple of people, you know, they asked me where to find recitations.”

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Some recitations are done without any musical backing whatsoever, but Penny tends to incorporate guitar, mandolin or accordion into his performances.

Lee and Penny have been playing together since 2018 – and the years since haven’t been the most stable. The COVID-19 pandemic, and subsequent social-distancing measures, made concerts awfully hard to organize. And that was exacerbated by Penny’s illness.

But now the coast is clear. And Lee has a wishlist: some tours of the province, some folk festival concerts and even a tour in Australia.

“Success for me would be if Dave's name became a household name in Newfoundland,” Lee said. “I really, honestly, with my whole heart, believe that that is almost criminal if it doesn't happen.”