#peter boyer

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Ellis Island: The Dream of America: Epilogue: "The New Colossus" (Emma L...

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Musical Moments in The Founding Father: His Story. Our Canada - “Song for Louis Riel”

If you have already seen the production, you know our storytelling is punctuated with music.

If not, prepare to experience what we have been calling “a play with music”.

“With music, you often don't have to translate it. It just affects you, and you don't know why.” 

This quote by David Byrne speaks to the power and inherent drama of music, and why we think it works so well in a bilingual performance piece like ours. Similar to the projections we use, music helps us tell the story without language. Neither French nor English, these visual and auditory cues aid audiences in understanding the plot, even if they speak neither English or French, or only one. 

All the tunes you hear in our show are traditional folk songs (sometimes with lyrics re-worked) except for one: “Song for Louis Riel” (performed by Cameron MacDuffee in our play) was loaned to us by Peter Boyer, who specializes in songs relating to Canadian history. 

Peter is an award winning songwriter, who has performed his songs on radio, television, and at live venues across Canada.  He has performed as a professional musician since 1970.

Peter has written original songs since his earliest days as a musician. He performed in coffee houses, such as Le Hibou Coffee House in Ottawa, and in concerts as a duo with his sister, Naomi Boyer as a folk duo called “Northwest”. One of his earliest collaborations was creating the music for Dan Aykroyd’s theatre production “Tom Paine”. The production was performed at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa. Peter has also received numerous songwriting awards and recognition, including: 2007; Great Lakes Songwriting Contest Semi Finalist – “Easy Street”, 2009; UK Songwriting Contest Semi Finalist – “The Faerie Queen”, 2010; Great Lakes Songwriting Contest Semi Finalist – “Song for Louis Riel”, 2013 UK Songwriting Contest Semi Finalist “Union Man” and “The Ghost of Bullock’s Tavern”.

Upon realization that very few songs existed about the War of 1812, Peter set out to add a few of his own to popularize some of the important events. With the help of cowriters Dan Loncke, Marty Lowman, and Beznik Yzeiri, Peter created 11 original songs and in the process recorded a 4th CD for Same Latitude As Rome, entitled “1812”. One of the songs from the CD, “Nous Sommes Canadiens” was used in a documentary about the French heritage of Essex County, Ontario, that was prepared by Radio-Canada.

Peter’s interest in the oral traditions of folk music, has led to the creation of many original songs based on Canadian historical events. “Union Man” is a tribute to the history of the labour movement in Canada, and “The Ghost of Bullock’s Tavern” is a true story of wrongful conviction in 1837, that fuelled the eventual abolition of the death penalty in Canada and in Michigan. “Song for Louis Riel” commemorated the 125th anniversary of the hanging of Louis Riel, entitled “Song for Louis Riel”. The song received extensive air play in Manitoba and Saskatchewan and was posted on the web site of the Louis Riel Institute. Other examples of Peter’s distinctive historical songs include “Cypress Hills Massacre” concerning an infamous event that took place in the Whoop Up area of Southern Saskatchewan on June 2, 1873,  and “David Thompson” a song honouring the world’s greatest land based geographer and explorer.

Same Latitude as Rome: “History never sounded so good”

[classicalclassroom]

Check it: a preview of our next episode featuring composer Peter Boyer. Full episode Monday 10/20!

[cheatsheet]

Lawrence O'Donnell at MSNBC has been stirring up a conspiracy theory that Newsweek made some deal with Sarah Palin to the cover story. Peter Boyer finally strikes back: "I'm glad to get career-passing grades from that great journalist Lawrence O'Donnell." Zing!