Conversations with Chrissy Lomax

Today we’d like to introduce you to Chrissy Lomax.

Chrissy, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
That is a loaded question but one word comes to mind, resilience. I have had some major interruptions in my life not to mention surviving the late 70’s as a road musician. And I’ll admit that I have been in my own way more than once but I never quit. Through all of the interruptions in my life, creating music has always been the one thing that pulls me back to where I started.

Who knew that a cancer diagnosis would bring my life full circle and bring me back to where I belong? I am celebrating my 5th year of living a cancer-free life and I have embraced all of the lessons I learned during my cancer journey. I feel a responsibility to share my story.

Remaining present was number one for me. Focusing on now is the only way to move forward. Write it out, to get it out – and that’s what I did. After my year of treatment, I started writing my book and completed the 8-song album that I started before my diagnosis. Music heals.

I hosted 6 episodes of my show, Cancer Free Life on LA Talk Radio and I got back to being a personal trainer and Pilates instructor as I healed my body, mind and spirit.

Two years out from diagnosis I was strong and ready to go…………… and then the world shut down. Going through a cancer journey brought on a sense of urgency so I couldn’t let anything stand in my way. I made a promise to myself when I was in the tunnels of treatment that I had to keep. Music had taken a back set in my life too many times and I promised myself that it had to be in the driver seat – leading the way. I’ve kept my promise.

My book and CD of the same title, Another Interruption were released in Feb. 2021 and I continued to write and record. My husband Joe Primeau and I have everything in-house to produce music and videos. So we did! I started a YouTube Channel and produced some Cancer Free Life cooking videos sharing my sugar-free recipes. About 4 months into the shutdown I wrote and recorded, “When The World Shut Down.” Joe and I had some musician friends from around the world join in on the song and video. I had the opportunity to be the voice of a lead role in a musical written by Nerissa Solovitz. I founded a 501c3 nonprofit called Cancer Free Life to help others through their journey. And I continued to heal. It feels like all of the experiences, challenges, interruptions, jobs and careers in my life have collided. I feel ready for anything that comes my way.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
To me, life is lessons, learning, challenges and struggles to be able to grow. I grew as a musician right after high school when I went on the road traveling across Canada first as a background singer/flautist/percussionist for a very slick Las Vegas-type entertainer. I went from jeans and T-shirt gigs to wearing gowns with sequins. I paid my dues and after a couple of years, took my own band out on the road to pay some more. One year during a break, a few days before Christmas, I got into the back seat of a car, and boom! Full stop! This was my first interruption. The Jaws of Life cut me out of that car and saved me. I was broken from head to toe with multiple skull fractures and broken ribs. My brain was swollen, affecting my vision and memory. It took me almost four years to recover fully. I gained back my strength, learned to walk again and got back into my life with my first band, STEP ONE. It was not quite 3 years after this trauma when I experienced the trauma of loss when my 41-year-old mom was diagnosed with colon cancer and died nine weeks later. This loss inspired me to fundraise for cancer research.

It was the mid 80’s when I moved to Toronto, worked in money market trading for the Royal Bank of Canada in the daytime and played clubs like The Elmo, The Diamond, The Bamboo and The Attic at night.

I met my husband Joe Primeau at Phase One Recording Studios in the Toronto area where he was a head engineer. I was signed to a production deal with Joe and his partner Howard Ayee (Rough Trade) first with my Toronto band TULA and then as a solo artist. It was also during this time that I met Barry Harris of Kon Kan. (I Beg Your Pardon, Puss N’ Boots) He was heading out on a tour with singer Kevin Wynne and needed a female voice – that was me! We toured mostly through the U.S. while I planned my wedding back in Toronto.

Joe and I were married in 1989 and just a few months later, we moved to LA in 1990. Joe went to work right away at Amigo Studios with Garth Richardson and Bob Ezrin and I started working where ever, doing whatever. Sometimes I worked through a temp agency and sometimes on a TV set as a P.A and I also did hair and make-up.

Through the 1990’s I performed solo with other musicians and bands I met along the way and I put my own band together. We played Ghengis Cohen, The Coconut Teaser, many festivals, coffee shops, benefit-concerts and where ever we could. Also in the 90’s, Joe and I both worked with Japanese singer/songwriter Anri in Japan, Hawaii and in LA. Joe was recording and mixing and I was writing chorus arrangements, vocal coaching and singing. I co-wrote a song with Anri and Lee Ritenour for her album, ‘Twin Soul.’

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
From 1997 to 2007, I was a leader and award-winning ambassador for Weight Watchers. I always loved to cook and feed people so I catered too. One of the groups I catered was the Jonsson Cancer Center Foundation/UCLA. Here was my chance to continue fundraising for cancer research in my new home with this group. It was 1995 when our group went to hear Dr. Dennis Slamon at a UCLA Westwood lecture. He needed more funds to help get his drug FDA-approved to save women dying from a fast-growing, aggressive breast cancer. This was the first gene-targeted therapy and I wanted to help. So I collected recipes, published a cookbook and donated the proceeds. This drug was approved in 1998 – but only for metastatic patients. It was approved for everyone with this type HER2neu Positive breast cancer in 2010. In 2017 this was my diagnosis and the drug I helped fundraise for – Herceptin – helped save my life. Fundraising works. Research works. In 2000 I found another way to make a difference in the fight against cancer. I first participated in a marathon for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society raising funds one mile at a time and then became one of their coaches for the Greater LA area until 2006. I then started my own marathon team called Team Believe and coached all ages, shapes, and sizes to marathon and half marathon finish lines until 2016.

It took a cancer journey to teach me to not be afraid of failure or judgement, to not worry about being good enough, pretty enough, skinny enough, funny enough. I had to get out of my own way and do what I love to do, what I am passionate about and believe that I am enough. I had to leave those limiting thoughts and beliefs behind in the tunnel. The last four years since I finished treatment have been the most creative, productive, and amazing years of my life. I am back with Kon Kan singing and playing my Tele in the Lost 80’s Live Tour with other 80’s bands like English Beat, Dramarama, Flock Of Seagulls, Wang Chung, and Stacey Q. I have been writing and recording new songs for me and for others. I have released two new music videos in the last couple of months with the most amazing, talented musicians at my side. I now live more, give more, help more, love more, laugh more, play more, write more, dance more and sing more. Life is so much more than surviving when you are thriving.

What was your favorite childhood memory?
I loved the sound of my voice when I sang in the stairwells of the apartments we lived in. I’d sit on the steps and sing my heart out making up songs as I discovered what my voice could do. It was around this time when I was about 10 – 12 years old that I found a massive acoustic guitar in the closet. I made up some chords to accompany the songs I was writing. Eventually, I found out that the chords that I thought I made up had names- D, C, E, F……… Eventually, I got my own guitar and continued to pour out my feelings into songs. I discovered the healing powers of music. I took my guitar everywhere with me to share my stories with whoever would listen.

During high school, I started to play with other musicians from acoustic, folk and jazz to rock bands. I grew up in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, home of Grant Avenue Studio. This was the first studio I ever recorded in and it was with Danny Lanois.

I’ve realized that the one thing missing during all of the most challenging times in my life was music. If I had only picked up the guitar, starting writing it out to get it out, maybe those times wouldn’t have been so hard. I’ll never know- just like I will never know how I got cancer. What I do know now is that I don’t want it back and that I will keep my promise to myself and honor my ability to write and perform music and never stop.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.chrissylomax.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chrissys_cancer_free_life/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/chrissy.lomax
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@chrissyscancerfreelife6348
• Other: https://www.amazon.com/Another-Interruption-Journey-Through-Positive/dp/B08TQ7DTNJ/ref=sr_1_1?crid=27CUO1X71J1RK&keywords=another+interruption&qid=1681065644&sprefix=another+interruption%2Caps%2C164&sr=8-1