Juno-winner Jeremy Dutcher pairs with Canadian orchestras on tour
Posted May 14, 2019 12:05 pm.
TORONTO — Acclaimed Indigenous singer Jeremy Dutcher is embarking on a fall tour paired with local orchestras from across the country.
The Polaris Prize winner, who grabbed heaps of attention at this year’s Juno Awards with his speech about reconciliation, is planning seven concerts in the symphony format.
Dutcher, who is a classically trained operatic tenor, will perform his album “Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa” with arrangements by Lucas Waldin.
Dates for the orchestral shows include two concerts in Kitchener, Ont. (Sept. 27 and 28), and stops in Winnipeg (Oct. 9), Halifax (Oct. 17), Regina (Oct. 19), Calgary (Nov. 8) and Saskatoon (Nov. 9).
“This tour sews together two musical halves of myself,” Dutcher said in a statement.
“A tour like this would not have been possible just one generation ago, and I am honoured to bring our sounds into the concert hall and give them the treatment their beauty commands.”
Dutcher’s 2018 album picked up the Indigenous music album Juno in March after garnering praise for its innovative production, which paired his singing with voice recordings of his ancestors made over a hundred years ago on wax cylinders.
The project was an effort to draw attention to the fading Wolastoq language, spoken in the Tobique First Nation, one of six Wolastoqiyik reserves in New Brunswick, where Dutcher spent much of his youth.
Dutcher also won multiple prizes earlier this month at the East Coast Music Awards in Charlottetown.
Follow @dfriend on Twitter.
The Canadian Press
