Indigenous Sounds

Collaborators pianist Elaine Keillor C.M. and composer/pianist Beverley McKiver play excerpts from the significant and growing body of piano music by Canadian Indigenous composers.

Elaine Keillor, CM, piano
Beverley McKiver, piano

The compositions by six Indigenous Canadian composers reflect various aspects of their values including aspects of nature — rivers, the importance of stars in navigating the sea or space with the sextant [Preneur d’étoiles], all animals [Curious Beast], the importance of each human, even if disabled […our inner lives were entwined…embroidered with the same pattern…]. Funerailles and the sonata Black Echoes concern in part the ongoing problems associated with colonialism. The composers selected include Karen Sunabacka (Métis of the Red River Settlement, Manitoba), Jesse Plessis (of BC, now resident in Montreal), Sonny Day Rider (Kainai-Blood Nation of Alberta), Beverley McKiver (Lac Seul First Nation in northwestern Ontario), T. Patrick Carrabré, a survivor of the Sixties Scoop, and Cris Derksen of the North Tail Cree, Alberta.

Program

…our inner lives were entwined…embroidered with the same pattern… (Karen Sunabacka)
Preneur d’étoiles (Jesse Plessis)
Curious Beast (Sonny Day Rider)
“Rivers,” from the two-piano suite Timelines (Beverley McKiver)
Sonata #1: Black Echoes (Patrick Carrabré)
Growing Forgiveness (Cris Derksen)
Funérailles (Patrick Carrabré)