Category: Indigenous

Browsing: Indigenous

First Peoples’ Festival: The big step forward

By Nathalie de Han on 12 August 2022 Indigenous

More than ever, the priority of this year’s International First Peoples’ Festival—the event that reaffirms the relevance and importance of First Nations artists, filmmakers, storytellers and dancers—is to create encounters, decompartmentalize imaginations, and free up talents capable of bringing forth the unprecedented. After a brief break, the director of the International First Peoples’ Festival is back at work. André Dudemaine has directed the festival for more than 30 years and, with his team, is putting the finishing touches on this year’s edition. For the visual arts section, which will be presented at La Guilde, the Festival will welcome Abenaki author,…

Tim Brady with the NEM: Cultural Dialogue

By Justin Bernard on 8 August 2022 Contemporary, Indigenous

Tim Brady loves a good challenge. His latest: setting poems in an Indigenous language to music. To do this, the composer-guitarist chose a poem collection entitled Uiesh (“Somewhere”) written by famous Innu poet Joséphine Bacon. “I really loved Joséphine Bacon’s work,” he said. “I thought it would be quite a challenge to compose music a singer would perform in an Indigenous language. The linguistic, grammatical, and syllable structures are very different from European languages. Joséphine helped me a lot, and I concluded that my music needed to use a simpler rhythmic language, more clear-cut to help each syllable stand out.…

CD Review | Elle (Analekta, 2022)

By Zenith Wolfe on 26 July 2022 CD and Book Reviews, Classical Music, Indigenous, Piano, Strings, Violin

Elle Angèle Dubeau, solo violin; Valérie Milot and Antoine Mallette-Chénier, harp; Lydia Etok and Nina Segalowitz, throat singing; La Pietà Analekta, 2022 Angèle Dubeau, solo violinist and conductor for the string ensemble La Pietà, has decided to use the ensemble’s 25th anniversary album, Elle, to showcase a variety of contemporary female composers. The result? A thrilling experience where the listeners never gets too comfortable with one style. Just as they come to understand the cool and brooding nature of Rebecca Dale’s Winter, for example, they’re surprised by the fiery Inuit throat singing of Katia Makdissi-Warren’s Mémoire. The album is filled with…

Laura Niquay

Newswire | SOCAN Foundation Announces Laura Niquay as Recipient of TD Indigenous Songwriter Award

By Newswire on 7 July 2022 Arts Industry, Indigenous, Newswire

Toronto, July 7, 2022 – The SOCAN Foundation is thrilled to announce Laura Niquay as the recipient of the annual TD Indigenous Songwriter Award. The critically acclaimed Attikamek artist from Trois-Rivières, QC is being recognized for her songs “Moteskano” and “Nicto Kicko”, works that offer a glimpse into her energized folk-grunge universe. Created in 2018, The SOCAN Foundation’s TD Indigenous Songwriter Award was created to recognize and celebrate the artistic merit demonstrated by Indigenous songwriters of any genre. Niquay will receive a cash prize of $10,000 in addition to opportunities and efforts toward her career development. Special distinction awards of…

Samora la Perdida and Christine Carmela; photo: Julieta Cervantes

Killing It….at New York City’s Soho Rep

By Charles Geyer on 15 June 2022 Indigenous, Musical Theatre, Popular Music, Theatre

REVIEW: Of Notes on Killing Seven Oversight, Management and Economic Stability Board Members, at New York City’s Soho Rep, 45 Walker Street; running through Sunday, June 19 (viewed here June 8). “The Great Wheel of Puerto Rican confusion spins on!” So declaims one of the characters in playwright Mara Vélez Meléndez’s capaciously titled new theater piece, Notes on Killing Seven Oversight, Management and Economic Stability Board Members, now playing at the Soho Rep. It’s a tag line that aptly summarizes the dizzying action and ambitious collision of themes that Meléndez sets in motion for this provocative hour-and-three-quarters of theatrical razzle…

A Mohawk dance (image provided by Présence Autochtone)

Newswire | Quai de l’Horloge to Host National Indigenous Peoples’ Day Celebration

By Newswire on 14 June 2022 Indigenous, Newswire

Montreal, June 14, 2022 – June 21, National Indigenous Peoples’ Day, is a sunny holiday. In these luminous days of June, opening the generous season of summer, Land InSights invites the public to celebrate the solstice in an immemorial continuity: ceremonies, concerts, poetry, perpetuate ancestral traditions today. At sunrise, a ceremony will be held at the First Nations Garden and will be webcast live via Facebook at 5:00 am. At the sun’s zenith, on the Quai de l’Horloge, great greetings will be given by Mohawk elders, the Buffalo Hat Singers’ drum and the songs of Innu artist Kanen. Along the…

FTA 2022: Recognizing Change

By Nathalie de Han on 9 April 2022 Arts Industry, Classical Music, Dance, Indigenous, La Scena Online, La Scena Spotlight, Scena Arts, Technology, Theatre

After two long years, the new co-artistic directors of the Festival TransAmériques (FTA), Martine Dennewald and Jessie Mill, announced a renewed international festival will be held in Montreal from May 25 to June 9. The two women, who have crossed paths at various festivals for several years, wanted to build on exchange and dialogue. Well-known to Montreal festivalgoers, Jessie Mill worked as artistic and dramaturgical advisor while Martin Faucher was head of the festival. Martine Dennewald, a born Luxembourger, directed the Festival Theaterformen in Brunswick, Lower Saxony (Germany) for six years. “We have to think about where we are today,…

Oktoecho: Transcestral (2021)

By Justin Bernard on 16 January 2022 CD and Book Reviews, Contemporary, Indigenous, Vocal, World Music

Katia Makdissi-Warren, musical and electronic arrangements; Joséphine Bacon, Innu poet; Nina Segalowitz, Inuit throat singer; Hélène Martel, vocals. The blending of styles and cultures is a topic that comes up a lot when we talk about world music. The approach of Katia Makdissi-Warren and the Oktoecho team, followed by a host of musicians, is somewhat different. Their Transcestral project is, rather, the meeting of two world cultures, Sufism, on the one hand, and that of the First Nations, on the other hand, which is put forward with the notable contribution of Western styles. Needless to say,…

Flute in the Wild (Centredisques, 2021)

By Justin Bernard on 24 December 2021 Canadian Music, CD and Book Reviews, Contemporary, Indigenous

Flute in the Wild Jaye Marsh, flutes; Heidi Elise Bearcroft, harp; Darren Hicks, bassoon; Andrew Morris, percussion; John Rice, storyteller; Christina Marie Faye and Richard Herriott, piano Label: Centrediscs, 2021 The album lives up to its name. Flute in the Wild, the flute in nature. Initiated by the flautist Jaye Marsh, this new release of Centredisques indeed immerses us in a rural universe, sometimes peaceful, sometimes intriguing, even scary. No need to know the music of Diane Berry, Elizabeth Raum, Richard Mascall and Richard Herriot to appreciate them as they awaken in us an imagination of…

Oktoécho presents the concert Transcestral: A gathering of sufi and indigenous peoples’ musical traditions

By Hassan Laghcha on 21 November 2021 Indigenous, World Music

Author : (NEWSWIRE)

Ensemble Oktoécho presents the concert Transcestral, on November 27, at 8 pm, at the Outremont Theatre. An original creation of the Oktoécho ensemble, the event brings together 15 artists, singers, dancers, and poets from different backgrounds: six indigenous and Sufi communities are represented as well as musicians from jazz, classical and contemporary music. Transcestral weaves together the sacred ancestral traditions of Sufi trance music and indigenous music from Canada. It is a true hymn to life, highlighting our perpetual quest for harmony and communion with nature. Active communities Known for their unique musical contributions, rich in poetic lyricism and inspired…