“We are singing for water,” says Susan Shantora.
Shantora will lead the Yellowknife Youth Choir in a 10th-anniversary celebration on Saturday evening, a free concert that sees the choir return to the Northern Arts and Cultural Centre for the first time since its opening show in 2014.
Saturday’s performance is named Water Song, which Shantora says is an attempt to bring the rain that could address the NWT’s low water crisis and keep wildfires away.
“When we came back from our evacuation in the fall, people were saying we desperately need water and we’re hoping for lots of snow, we’re hoping that the water stays,” Shantora said this week.
“We have several songs with water scenes, in hopes that maybe that sort of groupthought will help us bring some water to our very parched earth.”
Advertisement.
Advertisement.
The choir, featuring singers in grades 7 to 11, was formed 10 years ago for a NACC project with the Juno award-winning Gryphon Trio named Listen Up. Since then, the choir has travelled to places like Toronto, Halifax and Edmonton as well as hosting musical guests from across the country.
Other songs on Saturday’s list include “some of the songs written for us for that very first concert in 2014,” said Shantora, with a variety of returning alumni and musical guests on the bill:
- Barbara Fortin-Clinton and Kathryn Oraas, violin
- Flora Camuzet and Joanna Wilson, cello
- Matthew Bui, Joseph Curran and Aaron Juntilla, piano
- Maica MacEachern, flute
- Pat Braden, bass
- Al Bee, drums
- accompaniment by Keira Clinton
The concert begins at 7:30pm.
“It’s incredibly valuable,” said Shantora of the youth choir’s contribution to Yellowknife in its opening decade.
“They’re our next generation of musicians, performers, advocates and consumers of not just choral music, but of music in general. Our graduates have gone on to do theatre programs, they’re starring in music theatre in big cities like Vancouver and Toronto. They’re going on to study music, coming back to Yellowknife and performing.
“This is their hockey, their baseball, their soccer, it’s what they do. That’s where their friends are. It makes them feel good. It gives them a sense of pride and accomplishment. And it gives them something to work toward and a community to belong to.”
