Canada mourns a great folk hero - Kate McGarrigle

Musicians and members of both the artistic and medical communities paid tribute Tuesday to a beloved singer-songwriter and a courageous woman as they shared memories of Kate McGarrigle, who died of clear cell sarcoma the day before. The acclaimed folksinger, diagnosed with the rare form of cancer three and a half years ago, died at her home only weeks shy of her 64th birthday.

McGarrigle recorded a series of critically praised albums with her sister Anna between 1976 and 2005. Their compositions have been recorded by such artists as Linda Ronstadt, Emmylou Harris, Billy Bragg and Anne Sofie von Otter with Elvis Costello.

The singer-songwriter's marriage to singer Loudon Wainwright III, which ended in 1977, produced Rufus and Martha Wainwright, celebrated singers in their own right.

In 1993, she was made a Member of the Order of Canada.

When her son Rufus was featured on Elvis Costello's 2008 TV show Spectacle: Elvis Costello with..., McGarrigle appeared and sang the final song of the show with him.

McGarrigle was diagnosed with cancer in 2006 and established The Kate McGarrigle Fund at the McGill University Health Centre, which she set up in 2008 to raise awareness of sarcoma, a rare cancer that affects connective tissue such as bone, muscle, nerves and cartilage.

She died of clear cell sarcoma on January 18, 2010, aged 63 at her home in Montreal, according to her brother-in-law, Dane Lanken. She made her last public appearance, with Rufus and Martha Wainwright, at the Royal Albert Hall in London, just six weeks before her death. The show raised $55,000 for the Kate McGarrigle Fund.

As a tribute to the care that she received at the McGill University Health Centre, Kate McGarrigle establsihed the Kate McGarrigle Fund, a not-for-profit partner of the Cedars Cancer Institute and the MUHC Foundation.