Inaugural Mi’kmaw Music Festival to celebrate language and culture

The inaugural Mi’kmaw Music Festival is set for the weekend of Nov. 6-8, a celebration of culture, heritage, and language.

Taking place in Eskasoni, the festival is bringing Indigenous artists from across Nova Scotia and beyond to the First Nation community, including Alan Syliboy and the Thundermakers, Morgan Toney, The Mi’gmaq Boys and several others. It will also consist of storytelling sessions, meals, and games, all at the Sarah Denny Memorial Cultural Centre. The festival is free to attend.

It all begins on Friday, Nov. 6 with a youth gathering with pizza, Mi’kmaw trivia, and songs in both Mi’kmaw and English, as well as contests throughout the evening.

“It’s to promote the language,” said organizer Thomas Johnson. “Promote, show people that songs are available in Mi’kmaw from artists of the past.”

The events on Saturday, Nov. 7 kick off at 1 p.m., with acts playing music throughout the day with a break for supper. Johnson said tea and snacks will be available throughout the entire day. Supper will be served at 5 p.m. consisting of traditional Mi’kmaw foods and a storytelling session with one of the community’s elders.

“Stories are a big part of our knowledge transfer,” said Johnson. “We just want to pay homage to that, and then the band starts after.”

The music on Saturday resumes after supper until 1 a.m., leading to even more music and storytelling throughout Sunday.

Johnson chairs the Canadian commission for UNESCO’s Indigenous language committee alongside Indigenous leaders and language preservationists across Canada. He also contributes to the Nova Scotia Language Legislation Committee, a co-founder of the Eskasoni Mi’kmaw Language Initiative, and the founder of Kji-Wikuom Studios, a multimedia studio in Eskasoni.

The purpose of the festival, beyond giving people a good time, is to further propagate the Mi’kmaw language among youth — a language that has been suppressed.

“Let’s jump back 50 years, maybe even longer. People were encouraged not to speak,” said Johnson. “They said, you know, your child will not survive in the outside world if they can’t understand English.”

Much of Johnson’s career has been about bringing Mi’kmaw languages, and the languages of other Indigenous populations, back into the culture. From recording stories in the studio to advocating for an Indigenous Languages Decade (from 2022 to 2032), Johnson considers the festival another aspect of this education, giving community members an avenue to hear the language.

“It’s all about listening,” said Johnson. “The more you listen, the more you open up those channels in your brain that allow you to partake in a sort of immersion exercise, where one day you’ll just be able to speak it.

“Nobody is going to do it for us,” said Johnson. “We cannot go to another country and go get our language, because this is where it evolved.”

Ultimately, the festival is also a celebration of Mi’kmaw culture as a whole.

“To take pride. That’s one of the main things,” said Johnson. “People were shunned in the past, you know, to speak the language. Now, we’re celebrating it.”