Celebrating songs of Leelanau, “where people live in houses they built with their hands”
Photo courtesy of Aaron Olson
From staff reports
This year we’re launching a new story series that celebrates the songs inspired by Leelanau County and the Sleeping Bear Dunes. Whether they were written last month or 100 years ago, their lyrics and melodies pay homage to this peninsula and the shoreline we love.
Whenever possible, we’ll interview the musicians and songwriters behind these ballads and seek to capture the stories behind the songs. Throughout 2025 and beyond, you’ll read about these hymns in our print editions; we’ll also post videos on GlenArbor.com of these songs being performed.
We launch the series with the late Louan Lechler’s folk song, “I’m proud to say I live in Leelanau County, where people live in houses they built with their hands”—an homage to the homesteaders, the hippies, the craftsmen, the jacks of all trades who choose these woods to call home. Lechler passed away in March 2023 at age 77. According to her obituary, she “died of a worn-out heart from caring too much.”
For more than 50 years the singer-songwriter and poet wove herself into the local music scene. Lechler was a regular at area folk festivals, Song Writers in the Round, and a giant voice for 39 years at the Stone Circle gathering for poetry, music and storytelling in Antrim County. The Stone Circle inspired the Beach Bards Bonfire at the Leelanau School beach in Glen Arbor.
Her last big Leelanau County performance may have been Leelanau UnCaged in Northport in September 2022, when she played the Mill Street Stage with Jim Crockett, Mary Ann Rivers and Michael Camp. Lechler also performed at the Great Indoor Folk Festival in Traverse City just days before she passed.
“Louan Lechler was the real deal. A real folkie. A real poet. A real friend,” said fellow songwriter Michael Camp. “She gave it any time she had the chance, and she never once asked anything for it. She didn’t try to be famous. She never showed off. She just sang and smiled and told her wonderful stories, right to the end, because that’s who she really was. I will remember and love her for that until it’s my turn to leave the planet.”
The Glen Arbor Sun, which celebrates 30 years in 2025, is a free community publication supported by local advertisers and subscribers. Thanks for your readership and support.
