Shivering Songs Announces ‘Secret Path’ Film Screening And ‘Little Feet, Big Stage’.
Limited tickets remain in advance of festival’s seventh edition.
The Shivering Songs Festival is extremely pleased to add a screening of Gord Downie’s heralded Secret Path film on January 19 at The Fredericton Playhouse, as well as Little Feet, Big Stage, a family-oriented event slated for January 21 at the Fredericton Public Library. The Festival has also shared its full schedule, and declared weekend passes and both evening shows in the Wilmot United Church SOLD OUT. Now celebrating its seventh year, Shivering Songs runs January 19–22, 2017 in Fredericton, NB.
Secret Path tells the heartrending story of Chanie Wenjack, who died near Kenora, Ontario on October 22, 1966, as he tried to walk the nearly four hundred miles home from the Cecilia Jeffrey Residential School. Fifty years later, Tragically Hip frontman Gord Downie has memorialized Wenjack in a film, album and graphic novel illustrated by Jeff Lemire, using the multidisciplinary project as a vehicle for talking about reconciliation in Canada.
“Chanie haunts me,” wrote Downie, in a statement on Secret Path. “I never thought of Canada as a country – It’s not a popular thought; you keep it to yourself – I never wrote of it as so. The next hundred years are going to be painful as we come to know Chanie Wenjack and thousands like him – as we find out about ourselves, about all of us – but only when we do can we truly call ourselves, ‘Canada,’” he wrote.
The hour-long film, presented in partnership with the United Way of Central New Brunswick, will launch the Shivering Songs Festival at The Fredericton Playhouse this Thursday January 19 at 7:30 p.m. Admission will be free and open to all ages. Doors will open to the public at 7:00 p.m., and the film will be followed by a community conversation.
“It is with great respect that we offer our support to Secret Path and its presentation in New Brunswick,” said Festival co-organizer, Zach Atkinson. “While Gord himself is unable to join us at Shivering Songs, we look forward to involving his spirit as we welcome Chanie Wenjack’s story to our Festival and community,” he said.
Shivering Songs has also announced Little Feet, Big Stage, a free, family-oriented event hosted by the Fredericton Public Library on Saturday 21 January. Little Feet, Big Stage pairs children’s author Paul McAllister with the Calithumpians, for a dramatic reading of McAllister’s yet-to-be-released second book, A New Song For Herman. The event will run from 10:00am-12:00pm, and will also feature acting workshops and an arts and crafts station.
Finally, Shivering Songs has shared a full Festival schedule and announced that 2017 weekend passes and tickets to its shows featuring Rose Cousins, Basia Bulat, Donvan Woods and Justin Rutledge are now SOLD OUT. A limited number of tickets to the Festival’s remaining events are now on sale, both online at www.shiveringsongs.com and in person at the Etixnow kiosks at Gray Stone Brewing and Isaac’s Way in Fredericton. For more information on the Festival, please visit www.shiveringsongs.com.
A midwinter celebration of songwriting and storytelling, and flagship partner of Fredericton’s FROSTival, Shivering Songs hosts internationally renowned artists in rustic and historic spaces throughout Downtown Fredericton. Originally conceived as a small folk music festival to celebrate the album release of local group The Olympic Symphonium, the Festival has grown into a landmark cultural event that garners the attention of music and literary fans throughout Atlantic Canada and the Northeastern United States.
