On Thursday, October 12th, at 7:30 p.m., the Toronto Concert Orchestra, Showplace Performance Centre, and Market Hall Performing Arts Centre are presenting the world premiere of “Voice of a Nation” at Showplace Performance Centre in Peterborough, an evening of performance that celebrates Canada’s rich and varied history through the bridging of Indigenous and European artistic traditions.
Inspired by Canada 150, Maestro Kerry Stratton and the Toronto Concert Orchestra have created a multi-disciplinary concert program — featuring orchestra, song, dance, spoken word, choir, and film — that writes a new chapter in our nation’s history by placing the work of innovative and emerging First Nations artists and multi-cultural youth centre stage.
Opening the Voice of a Nation program are orchestral songs of poems of Cree/Métis poet Marilyn Dumont, written by Métis and French-Canadian composer Ian Cusson and sung by Métis Canadian mezzo-soprano Rebecca Cuddy. This work explores the Canadian experience from a First Nations lens within the context of a largely European form.
Composer Cusson says it is uncommon to hear First Nations stories presented in the classical music context, but believes that “this bridging of traditions and cultures speaks to our current moment as a nation where the rich diversity of our history is being recognized, acknowledged and celebrated.”
The six poems are from Dumont’s award-winning collection A Really Good Brown Girl (published by Brick Books in 1996) and centre on the experience of Canada’s Aboriginal peoples, focusing particularly on the Métis experiences of ‘half-ness’ and existing in-between cultures.
The poems confront the often-disturbing history of Canada’s Aboriginal peoples including the disappearance of Aboriginal women (“Helen Betty Osborne”), issues of territorial expansion and government apathy (“Letter to Sir John A. MacDonald”), shame over not being deemed ‘respectable’ (“The Red & White”), and the use of language as a tool to control (“The Devil’s Language”). The tone of the poems range from ironic and scathing to tender and intimate.
Following the song cycle, “L’histoire du soldat” by Igor Stravinsky will be re-imagined by First Nations choreographer Aria Evans through a truly Canadian lens. Distilling traits of the Trickster, this piece explores the motif of shape-shifting in terms of contemporary curated identities. The dance work will be performed live during the concert with dancers Syreeta Hector, Mayumi Lashbrook, and Raelyn Metcalfe.
An original choral piece, Perspectives, composed by Cusson and sung by the Peterborough Children’s Chorus will close the concert program. The work’s title refers to the varied cultural backgrounds of the youth who, through a six-week-long workshop, explored, and made meaningful, their experiences of Canada.
“It is our hope that this project will be a catalyst,” Cusson says, “helping Canadians to better know the stories of our nation and inspiring the next generation with its rich and varied history.”
Following the concert program, there will be a screening of the remarkably insightful documentary film Twelve by filmmaker Lester Alfonso, which explores the Canadian experience through the voices of 12 diverse subjects, each of whom moved to Canada — like the filmmaker himself — at the age of 12.
Tickets for Voice of A Nation are available now at the Showplace box office (290 George St. N., Peterborough), by phone at 705-742-7469 or toll free at 1-866-444-2154, or online at showplace.org. Tickets are $42 for adults and $22 for students.
In addition to the performers themselves, Voice of a Nation brings together a dynamic ensemble of artistic talent:
- Maestro Kerry Stratton is the Conductor and Music Director of the Toronto Concert Orchestra. He also serves as Conductor for a varied schedule of performances and recordings with a long list of European and international orchestras, and hosts a popular classical music radio show.
- Voice of a Nation composer Ian Cusson studied composition with Jake Heggie (San Francisco) and Samuel Dolin, piano with James Anagnoson at the Glenn Gould School, and completed a mentorship with Johannes Debus. He is an inaugural Carrefour Composer in Residence with the National Arts Centre Orchestra for 2017-2019, and an Associate Composer of the Canadian Music Centre.
- Voice of a Nation director Michael Hidetoshi Mori is an award-winning stage director and the Artistic Director of Tapestry Opera in Toronto. He has won a Dora Mavor Moore award for outstanding direction, and been nominated for a Juno Award as a performer and music director.
Prior to the world premiere performance of Voice of a Nation in Peterborough, a collaborative Community Engagement Program will be offered.
A Canada 150 Panel, presented in association with the Chanie Wenjack School for Indigenous Studies at Trent University, will engage participating Voice of A Nation artists and local indigenous artists and intellectuals in conversation about the critical importance of art and performance to the shaping of national identities and the emergence of a post-colonial Canada.
David Newhouse, Director of the Chanie Wenjack School for Indigenous Studies at Trent, will moderate. The panel takes place at 8 p.m. on Tuesday, October 10th at Showplace Performance Centre and admission is pay what you can.
As part of the annual Pine Tree Talk lecture series sponsored by the Chanie Wenjack School for Indigenous Studies at Trent University, in partnership with Public Energy, Indigenous performance artists Brian Solomon and Aria Evans will speak on contemporary dance and curatorial practice, and its ability to tell the story of our lives and bring us together as a society.
The Pine Tree Talk takes place at 12 p.m. on Wednesday, October 11th at Nozhem: First Peoples Performance Space (Enweying Building at Gzowski College, Trent University) and admission is free.
This guest post was written by Susan Oliver, Voice of a Nation Peterborough Project Lead for Toronto Concert Orchestra.
