Indigenous music leads the way as Desautels Concert Hall sees first big weekend

The Desautels Concert Hall at the University of Manitoba will officially become a part of the musical fabric of Winnipeg with a slew of performances by community ensembles in the coming weeks. 

The hall, long anticipated by music lovers in the city, first opened its doors back in September with a gala concert featuring beloved local sopranos Tracy Dahl and Andriana Chuchman, the Borealis Piano Trio and the Desautels Jazz Faculty Quartet.  

For Mel Braun, voice area head at the University of Manitoba’s Desautels Faculty of Music, the best part about that opening night was hearing the role that hall could play in the community. “The best part was after the concert was over, in the lobby, people sitting there and conversing. This is the kind of community we want to build.” 

“It’s an opportunity for the community to come to us.” 

The stage has seen scattered concerts since then with performances by groups such as the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra, but now, the concert hall will welcome several groups in the span of just a few weeks. 

“They’ve all been overjoyed,” says Braun when asked about what the performers have thought of the venue so far. “When the stage is fully open, it’s the kind of acoustic where you can sing as soft as you want and be heard everywhere. But when you do open things up… the hall rings like crazy.” 

The 407-seat hall itself can open into three different configurations, each equipped for the different types of concerts that will grace its stage. Braun says this gives students at the university a whole range of opportunites for learning about performance, including inside of an orchestra pit. 

“We’ve never had at the university this kind of space,” he elaborates. “We really look forward to our students having this opportunity to see what it’s like out in the professional world.” 

Cree playwright and musician Tomson Highway. (Source: Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra)

Indigenous art leads the way for opening weekend 

The hall’s first full weekend kicks off on Saturday, October 19th with the Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra in collaboration with Cree auteur Tomson Highway. The award-winning playwright and Order of Canada recipient will present a musical expansion of his works including The Rez Sisters and The Post Mistress alongside vocalist and longtime collaborator Patricia Cano and the Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra. 

“It’s the most honest music I’ve ever heard,” says director and alto saxophonist Neil Watson, who has been building this program for over five years on behalf of the Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra. This has included collaborating on brand-new arrangements that take the music to a different level, and also  

In spite of all the planning that has gone into this concert, Watson admits that even he has no idea quite what will happen on Saturday night. Part of that is a credit to Highway’s trademark creative whimsy. “You can expect the unexpected. You never really know where Tomson Highway is going to go in conversation or even in the music that he chooses.” 

“He has this youthful, bubbling enthusiasm for absolutely everything,” Watson explains. “You walk away from your time with him feeling better about yourself and the world around you. I think Winnipeg audiences are in for a real treat.” 

The Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra concert also highlights a theme of the first handful of performances at the new concert hall: the centering of Indigenous voices. The opening gala concert featured award-winning singer-songwriter and University of Manitoba alumnus William Prince, and the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra featured two-spirit Cree baritone Jonothan Adams in its first concert of the 2024-2025 season, Lament. 

“I think it’s just wonderful,” says Watson on the shared nature of the first few concerts in the hall. “I love the way that [Tomson] celebrates his culture and fuses it with different styles of music from all over the world.” 

Nestawaya is Dead of Winter’s opening concert. (Source: Dead of Winter)

The theme of fusion will also be present in the Desautels Concert Hall on Sunday afternoon. Choral ensemble Dead of Winter opens up its season with Nestawaya, an examination of the role of water in the pre-settler context of Treaty One territory, and how it is stewarded today. 

“This is a very unique and profound show,” says Dead of Winter’s artistic director Andrew Balfour, who also composed several pieces for the concert. He likens it to a sound ceremony, celebrating and honouring such a fundamental element that unites all peoples. 

Highlighting the connection between humans and water is also fundamental in the movements within Nestawaya. To facilitate these movements, Dead of Winter brought in Patty Shaughnessy of Curve Lake First Nation and her partner Bill Coleman, who have served as directors for this project.  

“We’re made of water and you can see how sound is travelling up the human body, which resembles water,” says Shaughnessy. 

The rest of the guest artists on the roster are also entirely Indigenous, from local waterkeepers who will share teachings throughout the concert, to a roster of composers that includes Melody McKiver and Ian Cusson.  

Perhaps the most noteworthy contributor to the concert is lauded Winnipeg poet katherena vermette. The author of The Circle, The Break, and North End Love Songs has contributed a poem called river woman that each composer has set in their own unique way, and that she herself will read from.

“It’s an honour,” says Balfour of vermette’s involvement. “Kate is a wonderful jewel for our community. She is a lifelong Winnipegger, and I think it makes total sense to collaborate with her in such a meaningful way. 

Nestawaya takes the stage at the Desautels Concert Hall on October 20th at 3pm, with the Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra and Tomson Highway playing on October 19th at 7:30pm. To learn more about these concerts, you can visit the Desautels Concert Hall website here.