Jeremy Dutcher

This post is long. There are no pictures of Jeremy, as I don't have any I took myself and I'm not stealing any from the internet. As well, his appearance has changed greatly since he first emerged on the scene. I don't want to distract anyone with photos--don't judge a book by the cover.  Also discussed in here is Treaty Recognition Week, and the problems with the term "world music".  I am by no means an expert, but this post builds on what I have learned from hours of Jeremy Dutcher videos and interviews, as well as other investigations.

In the summer of 2021 I was taking an Additional Qualification course online. It was Primary/Junior Vocal Music, Part 1. I have a degree in music (almost a B.Mus but not quite), and Intermediate/Senior Instrumental Music qualifications. I knew nothing about teaching the years up to grade 7 when we usually start band instruments here. The course said you'd learn about singing, recorders, ukuleles, Orff and Kodaly.

I can't say I learned much about those things, but I did deepened my knowledge of "De-colonizing the Classroom."  The instructor was really keen on cultural representation as being the norm.  This meant books that had characters just living normal lives, but within their cultures--not as a way to show the differences by teaching, or highlighting, the difference, but just as part of their normal lives. Music from different cultures is worthwhile to learn on its own merits, not as a highlight reel to the "historical focus of the month". To often here, a type of music is only used during its historical significance month. It's an easy way to organize the year when time is limited.

For years, many teachers would do a unit focusing on "world music". I even took a "World Music" course in university.  How white was that?! We all live in the world. We all make music. There are similarities and difference between one culture and another, but why is "classical" music called classical and the default genre in music class, and gamelan is a 5 minute mention in a unit? This always annoyed me. Indian "classical" music is incredibly complex, not relegated to just the "Classical Time Period", and is highly regarded as a superior form of music in India. In their world, it's not world music.

One Canadian artist (because we still want to focus on Canadian artists) that we were introduced to was Jeremy Dutcher. Our instructor shared a video, "Mehcinut." WHO was this? WHAT was this? WHY was this? The hat brought to mind Gord Downie's outfits for the Tragically Hip's farewell tour.  Everything else was so intense, new, fresh but ancient at the same time. You could feel the ancestors' energies coming forth from his words and melody.  

The story of the song, and the video is worth knowing, and you can read HERE and watch HERE.

In a nutshell, an anthropologist came to the Wollostoq (Maliseet) communities in the 1920s in New Brunswick. Traditional songs were recorded on wax cylinders and given to the Canadian Museum of History at some point. Like many traditional languages in Canada, Wolastoq is considered endangered. When Jeremy recorded his first album (2019), there were only about 100 speakers of the language. He reports now that it's up to about 500, thanks to the immersion school his mother founded. 

Jeremy was told about the cylinders by a "song keeper" named Maggie Paul. I love the term song keeper. It falls in with the idea that the Indigenous don't own the land, the animals, the resources and that extends to the less tangible things they create and share. Often, songs would come to an Indigenous person through meditation, dreaming, or an interaction in their environment. They would not claim the song as their own, but they were the keeper of it, to pass it on to others when required. 

After the online classes that day, I headed to YouTube to find out more about Jeremy Dutcher. Probably one of the first stops was his NPR Tiny Desk Concert, from May 2019.  It starts with light, solo piano over the title card, then opens with his black fingernails on masculine looking hands on the piano, shimmering purple sequins catching the light. When I first shared this with a class, I gave no back story. As the hands appeared, a student (grade 7 or 8) asked, "Is that a man or woman?" I was so happy when a classmate responded "It doesn't matter."

This Tiny Desk Concert is incredible. Jeremy is a classically trained opera singer so the Western styling and skills are definitely present in the quality and timbre of his voice. Yet he's singing not in Italian, or German, but in a language most Canadians haven't even heard of. The piano, drums and cello are Western, the language and melodies are Wollostoq, but the emotions are universal. 

Yet, as smitten as I became, I was struggling. His music is not easily definable. Indigenous? What does that even mean? When I took World Music in university in the early 90s, we learned there were grass dances, and pow wow songs and not much else. Indigenous music can range from traditional throat singing of the Inuit, to the modern stylings of Snotty Nose Rez Kids and The Halluci Nation. Can "classical" music composed or performed by an Indigenous artist still be classical? 

Why are we even using the term "Classical" music anymore? Maybe that's the bigger question.

I often tell students I'm not going to teach them about the Dead White Guys of Europe, except within contexts that make them relevant. Just because Mozart wrote a song doesn't mean it's more worthy of a 30 min class than if Cris Derksen wrote it. 

Last weekend, a dream came true when I got to see Jeremy Dutcher perform with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. I didn't realize it at the time, but it was also the summer equinox, and National Indigenous People's Day. 

To say it was amazing, would be an understatement. Jeremy is the only Canadian artist to win the Polaris Prize twice. His juxtaposition of classical sounds and instruments with the ancient language is magical. 

At one point, early on, Jeremy made reference to Classical music and the question of why it's the only music called Classical when there are modern composers writing for the same orchestration (such as Cris Derksen who's piece "Round Dance" from Orchestral Pow Wow was also performed), as well as other combinations. He offered the phrase "Western Art Music" to cover those historic and modern pieces that encompass the classic instrumentation of a symphony. I love this idea! Students often get confused by how the Classic Period is a set time frame, but instrumental orchestral music from other times is also called classical. It is the musical equivalent to the works of art hanging in museums, both modern and old. It's different from music created for radio play, chart topping, massive stadium concerts. Yes, we have the folk vs pop designations, etc, but there's something more about the intentional composition that must happen when composing for an orchestra. It's an art.

I could say so much more.  In 2023 my husband and I toured around New Brunswick. 

We stood over looking Grand Falls, and like I often do when surrounded by nature, I thought of those first people of this land. I honour them with my thoughts and appreciation. As we drove across the empty middle of New Brunswick for 100km, I read about the actions of the NB gov't, especially regarding the creation of hydro power on the rivers. 

When I returned to school that fall, I had a grade 4, and a grade 4/5 class. Treaties Recognition Week (first full week of November) was coming and I had struggled with how to bring this into the music class. I decided to discuss the wax cylinders and their removal from the community they represent. The students were aghast. Their quick answer was to just bring them back to New Brunswick. But then what? Music only lives when it is shared. This segued into Jeremy using them to create new music. Does he own this new music? He is, in a way, now the song keeper for these wax cylinders, even if they still live in Ottawa.

I also brought up how much of the music was about water, and that I had trouble finding the Wolastoq River on maps. I saw and heard that name used a lot. I could find the Tobique River, where his reservation is, but not the Wolastoq River. Finally, I found out that it is the ancestral name for the St John River. When I told students that the British and French explorers changed names to suit their own culture, the students were shocked. "Can they just do that?" one asked.

Oh, sweet child, they could, and they did, much more than your brain can absorb right now. 

There is a movement to reclaim Indigenous place names. You can see this on Jeremy's ads; his Toronto concert was listed as Tkaronto.  

We are blessed to have a talent like Jeremy Dutcher in Canada. I hope this post encourages you to think critically about the music you incorporate into your lessons. Are you using a Beethoven symphony to teach about symphonic structure? Maybe there's a Canadian that fits that requirement. Are you giving the impression to your Indian students that their music is part of  "world" music, not relevant to their current community? Do your students learn the Penguin Dance during a folk dance unit or during Albanian Heritage Awareness month? The use of the term world music, creates a division. If a student identifies with an ethnic community who's music you spotlight because it is "other", then the student will have a hard time thinking they belong "here".

All music is world music. I was supplying in a class and had to hand out a word search on "World Music Instruments".  A student that identified as Korean asked why piano wasn't on the list. We talked about who's lens was used to decide what was "other."  To her, a piano was unique and unknown. It is a world instrument to her, but obviously not to the creator of the word search.

Unfortunately, while Western Art Music is a great term to start using, there isn't a great label for when we want to talk about music from other places in the world. Some say Global Music, but that's not really different. Some say ethnic, but does that mean then that a white person from Minnesota can't play the steel pan? Sometimes we can use the culture or region, but that can get cumbersome and "othering". My only advice is to be mindful, and open to questioning. Don't single out students or assume they know the latest Bollywood hit. Invite culture bearers into your classroom if possible--parents, friends, etc. 

All music is worth learning about!