About Jeremy Dutcher · New Brunswick, Canada
Jeremy Dutcher is a two-spirit song carrier, composer, activist, ethnomusicologist and classically-trained vocalist from New Brunswick who currently resides in Montréal. A Wolastoqiyik member of North-West New Brunswick’s Tobique First Nation, Jeremy is best known for his debut album, Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa (The Songs of the People of the Beautiful River), recorded following a research project on archival recordings of traditional Wolastoqiyik songs at the Canadian Museum of History. Jeremy transcribed songs sung by his ancestors in 1907 and recorded onto wax cylinders, transforming them into “collaborative” compositions. The album earned him the 2018 Polaris Music Prize and a 2019 Juno for Indigenous Music Album of the Year plus a 2019 NPR Tiny Desk concert. Jeremy’s music transcends boundaries: unapologetically playful in its incorporation of classical influences, full of reverence for the traditional songs of his home, and teeming with the urgency of modern-day resistance.
Five years after rising to international acclaim, Dutcher returns to the stage with a new band and pivotal new music. On the Motewolonuwok tour, Dutcher invites audiences to be transformed by music that is more personal and intimate than ever, yet pushes the boundaries of his unique sonic landscape.
This next sonic journey is rooted in an ancestor quote:
Tan qiniw iyuwok wasis kpomawsuwinuwok, 'tankeyutomon-oc kihtahkomikomon.
As long as there is a child among our people, we will protect the land.