Jian Ghomeshi profile: A look at his career before the scandal

By The Canadian Press

Jian Ghomeshi was a radio star with a devoted national following and a fledgling international audience for his insightful CBC Radio chat show “Q”, but a month of headlines in a scandal that now sees him facing sexual assault charges has given him a new reputation. Here is a look at Ghomeshi’s career before the scandal erupted that has seen him ousted from his job at CBC and facing four counts of sexual assault and one count of what is called “overcome resistance — choking,” charges to which his lawyer said Wednesday he plans to plead not guilty:

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Born in England to Iranian parents, Ghomeshi moved to the Toronto suburb of Thornhill at nine years old. He attended York University before first finding public attention with the founding of the satirical folk-pop outfit Moxy Fruvous in the late ’80s.

Ghomeshi (then sometimes credited as “Jean”) played drums and sang, and over the ’90s the band found modest success in Canada by mixing cheeky social commentary and winsome-if-slight pop songwriting redolent of They Might Be Giants. They were nominated for group of the year at the 1994 Juno Awards alongside Rush and Blue Rodeo (the Rankin Family won).

The band was winding down as the millennium turned and in 2002 Ghomeshi shifted into broadcasting, becoming host of an arts-oriented CBC Newsworld program. His ascension at the public broadcaster was swift: he hosted several more music-related CBC shows including “50 Tracks” and “The National Playlist” before landing a temporary gig filling in for “Sounds Like Canada” host Shelagh Rogers.

As the Globe and Mail reported in 2012, Ghomeshi “ruffled feathers” during his 11-week stint as host by making changes intended to draw in a younger audience. Nevertheless, Ghomeshi also struck a chord, and accumulated the currency to launch a show of his own in April 2007: “Q.”

The live, usually 90-minute cultural chat program soon became a centrepiece of CBC Radio’s lineup, a showcase for A-list guests and catnip for a younger generation that otherwise proved elusive for CBC.

Beyond possessing a dulcet voice, Ghomeshi was a sophisticated and decidedly hip presence on CBC’s airwaves. He possessed a cultural facility aided by a long career in music and a finger-on-the-pulse knack to spin opening “essays” with much viral value. His Twitter account had roughly 284,000 followers as of Monday afternoon _ CBC’s own had only 103,000.

Notably, Ghomeshi also had a knack for making celebrity guests feel comfortably swaddled in admiration while nudging them toward acknowledgements of criticism or personal revelations they might have been disinclined to share in other interviews.

An award-winning interview with Leonard Cohen probed mortality, love and sex, with Cohen answering an intensely personal question about whether he regretted not committing to a lifelong partner by singing: “Non, je ne regrette rien.”

With Ghomeshi, Beach Boys legend Brian Wilson once reflected on his troubled life and a father who was “nothing but mean,” Joni Mitchell discussed giving up a child and suffering from “disease after disease,” while Neil Young, in the midst of personal turbulence, stopped by recently to discuss a lifetime of “quick decisions.” Other rare guests to visit the “Q” studios included Jay Z, Paul McCartney and, recently, Barbra Streisand.

Most infamous was Ghomeshi’s 2009 interview with Oscar-winning actor-turned-musician Billy Bob Thornton. The Arkansas native didn’t like that Ghomeshi referenced his film career and as a result petulantly murmured his way through the rest of the interview, barely answering any questions except to most notably complain about Canadian audiences.

The awkward interview only seemed to intensify the public’s admiration for Ghomeshi. And as other CBC personalities migrated for richer, private pastures, Ghomeshi became increasingly integral to the public broadcaster, a cross-platform star (“Q” also airs on CBC-TV) who supplied the face and voice of the Canada Reads literacy campaign and also steered the annual Scotiabank Giller Prize gala. (Organizers have announced they will turn to someone else this year). He authored a book of his own as well, the non-fiction tome “1982.”

The Thornton incident also earned much international attention _ to this day, it constitutes a section of Thornton’s Wikipedia entry _ and Ghomeshi’s profile has grown steadily outside of Canada.

In 2010, “Q” achieved syndication in the United States care of Public Radio International. At the time CBC cut times with him, “Q” was airing on more than 180 stations.

The U.S. press took notice. A 2012 New York Times feature detailed Ghomeshi’s rise with the headline “A Wild Mix of Culture By Way of Canada,” while the Washington Post ran a thorough profile last year that touted Ghomeshi’s “magnetism.”

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