[2004]
Testo di Maria Dunn
Musica tradizionale ucraina
Lyrics by Maria Dunn
Traditional Ukrainian music
Album: "We Were Good People"
"Growing up in Alberta with the Rockies as a favourite holiday destination, I only learned about the WWI internment of Ukrainian Canadians in the national parks on a trip to Jasper in Spring 2000. There, I came across Bill Waiser's book, Park Prisoners. Shortly afterwards, I read In the Shadow of the Rockies: Diary of the Castle Mountain Internment Camp, 1915-1917 by Bodhan Kordan & Peter Melnycky. When war broke out in 1914, Galicia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Ukrainian immigrants (often referred to as "Galicians" in the early 1900s) became "enemy aliens" in Canada, the very place that had actively encouraged their immigration. Ironically, most of them viewed their former Austro-Hungarian rulers not with loyalty, but as occupiers... (continua)
Young stranger, as you walk these trails of beauty (continua)
[2004]
Testo e musica di Maria Dunn
Lyrics and music by Maria Dunn
Album: "We Were Good People"
"Velma Carter and Gwen Hooks inspired this song. Both women were born and raised in Alberta's Black pioneer communities in the early 1900s and both worked as teachers in rural Alberta. Their families had emigrated from the United States, seeking to farm without the prejudice and restrictions of the American Jim Crow laws. Although they met with no legal discrimination, Black immigrants weren't exactly embraced by a tolerant Alberta. In 1911, Edmonton MP Frank Oliver responded to the fear and prejudice of a vocal minority of his constituents by drafting an unsuccessful government Order-in-Council to bar Blacks from settling in Canada for a year. The song's chorus was inspired by a passage in Gwen Hooks' book The Keystone Legacy: Recollections of a Black Settler (1997): 'Times were hard then, but when you are free, hard times are easier to take.' "
(Maria Dunn)
Her parents came to Wildwood before she was born (continua)
[2004]
Testo e musica di Maria Dunn
Lyrics and music by Maria Dunn
Album: "We Were Good People"
"In the summer of 2002, I visited the Bellevue Mine in the Crow's Nest Pass. Emerging from the cold, black tunnel into a beautiful summer day in the mountains was a powerful experience, indeed. The nearby remains of the Frank Slide of 1903 must have testified daily to miners of the dangers in the area, particularly in the early 1900s. In 1914, the Hillcrest Mine explosion left 189 men dead and buried in a graveyard across the valley from Bellevue. Those thoughts, along with the knowledge of a thriving illegal liquor trade during Alberta's prohibition years (1916-1922), sparked this song."
(Maria Dunn)
From heaven to hell, he passes each day (continua)
[2004]
Testo e musica di Maria Dunn e Shannon Johnson
Lyrics and music by Maria Dunn and Shannon Johnson
Album: "We Were Good People"
"As the year 2000 approached, I was invited to participate in a songwriting project to commemorate the New Year (The Millennium Project, First Night Festival, Edmonton). After reading about and reflecting on the turn of the last century, I couldn't shake the wonderful image of the all-night country dances of the early 1900s. Separated from those people by 100 years of rapid social change, we still hope for the same things today-peace and plenty. The phrase itself caught my attention by way of a beautiful tune of the same name composed by Scottish musician Brian McNeill."
(Maria Dunn)
I was born in 1899, December thirty first (continua)
[2008]
Testo e musica di Maria Dunn
Arrangiamenti di Maria Dunn & The McDades
Lyrics and music by Maria Dunn
Arranged by Maria Dunn & The McDades
Album: "The Peddler"
The horrors of this bloody war, I'll take to my grave (continua)
Testo di Maria Dunn
Musica tradizionale ucraina
Lyrics by Maria Dunn
Traditional Ukrainian music
Album: "We Were Good People"
"Growing up in Alberta with the Rockies as a favourite holiday destination, I only learned about the WWI internment of Ukrainian Canadians in the national parks on a trip to Jasper in Spring 2000. There, I came across Bill Waiser's book, Park Prisoners. Shortly afterwards, I read In the Shadow of the Rockies: Diary of the Castle Mountain Internment Camp, 1915-1917 by Bodhan Kordan & Peter Melnycky. When war broke out in 1914, Galicia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Ukrainian immigrants (often referred to as "Galicians" in the early 1900s) became "enemy aliens" in Canada, the very place that had actively encouraged their immigration. Ironically, most of them viewed their former Austro-Hungarian rulers not with loyalty, but as occupiers... (continua)