AIRsessions Workshop: Ila Barker and Leela Gilday
Season 3 | Episode 9
- Zoom event
- English
Artist-in Residence Ila Barker is joined by Leela Gilday
If you’re from the North, Leela Gilday’s music is home. If you’ve never been, it will take you there. Born and raised in the Northwest Territories, she writes about the people and the land that created her. The power in her voice conveys the depth of her feelings of love and life in a rugged environment and vibrant culture, as if it comes straight from that earth. Leela’s family is from Délįne on the shore of Great Bear Lake and her rich vocals dance across the rhythmic beats of traditional Dene drumming as smoothly as a bass line onstage the largest venues in the country. And she has played them all.
Leela has toured festivals and concert halls with her four-piece band through every province and territory in Canada. She has played in the United States, Greenland, Australia, New Zealand and several countries in Europe. Her live shows are where she connects with fans who have followed her on a 20-year career and where new fans are born. She reaches into their hearts and feels the energy of every person in front of her as she guides them on a journey through song and experience. She believes music has an inexplicable effect on people. It is a place where she can share light and dark and the most vulnerable moments, with a clarity and genuine purpose that reassures her listeners through every word. She is a storyteller, and through this, reflects the world onto itself.
Five years after her last album was released—five years of growth, healing and head-down work—Leela’s fifth album North Star Calling was released fall 2019. It is more raw, more intimate and more Leela than anything you’ve heard from her before.
Register to participate in this small-group online session to learn about how these artists make music and to share your questions and musical ideas. Priority registration to Indigenous youth aged 13 to 25. Other participants accepted if space is available.
The workshop will take place on Zoom. To register and for more information, please contact Ila at ilabarkermusic@gmail.com.
This series is presented as part of the NAC Music Alive Program: Manitoba, in partnership with the sākihiwē festival, Music for Life, Indigenous Music Development Program at Manitoba Music and Canada Council for the arts.
This live event adheres to the health and safety guidelines of the region in which it was recorded.
