Transporting church bells to Red River (modern day Winnipeg) was one of the most difficult tasks of the York boat brigades that made the arduous seven-week voyage from Hudson Bay. When the cathedral of St. Boniface burnt down in 1860, not only did residents lose the familiar sight of their beloved church, but they lost…
Selling Respectability: Pianos as “instruments of the cultured” in late nineteenth century Canada.
As Canada underwent industrialization and urbanization in the late nineteenth century, respectability was priced and sold by music stores in newspaper advertisements across Canada. Pianos were hailed as “within the reach of people of modest means,” and “no longer a luxury.” Now, they were “a necessity”, an important status-symbol of domestic respectability. The language in…
Easter 1801 at a Trading Post: Scarcity, Illness, and Dancing
In 1801, Archibald Norman McLeod was overwintering at Fort Alexandria, a small post on the upper waters of the Assiniboine River near the border of present-day Manitoba and Saskatchewan. Two men arrived from nearby Shell River on Easter Sunday with letters that complained of a scarcity of “Liquor, goods, &c.” in the region. On Monday,…
“I loved to dance:” music and mobility of Métis merchant Johnny Grant
There are precious few autobiographies of Métis, and Johnny Grant’s provides a wealth of information about life in western North America in the nineteenth century. Mobility is one of its major themes. Grant was a prolific traveler and his social adaptability was enhanced by his love of dancing. Born in Edmonton in 1833, Johnny Grant…
“This note, utterly unknown in Red River:” Louis Riel and the sound of bugles in 1870.
Bugles were the army’s loudest musical instrument, the most prominent sound-symbol of force, and in 1870 they may have been all that Colonel Garnet Wolseley’s expeditionary army needed. William Butler’s The Great Lone Land provides the following account: “It is said that it was only the bugle-sound of the skirmishers that finally convinced M. Riel…
“It is so different here:” John Askin ordering violins to Michilimackinac, 1778.
Every spring, canoes departed Montreal with goods for the trading posts of the Great Lakes and to the west. If items were omitted or lost, it would be another long season before they could arrive. The following passage is from a letter by merchant John Askin to Messrs. Todd & McGill in Montreal after the…
“Pretty Considerable Loud:” a dance party in Kingston in 1814-15.
The elder brother of Sir Francis Bond Head, George Head worked as a clerk and commissariat around the British empire in the early nineteenth century. He traveled from Halifax to Lake Huron in the winter of 1814 – 15, and his journal was used as the basis of his Forest Scenes and Incidents, in the…
Pehr (Peter) Kalm’s account of music, 1749-1751
Pehr Kalm’s was a Finnish naturalist whose voyage to New France in 1749 is one of the most comprehensive first-hand accounts of life in the St. Lawrence in the eighteenth century. He attended the University of Åbo and studied under two followers of Carl Linnaeus. The purpose of his trip to North America was to…
French and English singing together in Upper Canada
In 1814, music facilitated the interactions of French and English along the shore of Lake Huron. In the diary of George Head, he describes a group traveling who “whistled, sang, and ran races with each other along the ice.” When he was on his way to Penetanguishine, he observed French Canadians and English in a…
The arrival of bells
An assortment of bells from the fur trade era. Small “hawks” bells such as these, as well as other varieties such as horse and sleigh, were major trading items carried by fur traders throughout North America. First Nations adapted bells into their material culture, adorning garments and accessories, and providing a wide range of timbres…
North West Company fur trader George Keith’s description of Dane-zaa (Dene) musical culture
Letters to Mr. Roderic McKenzie 1807-1817. The Mackenzie River and Great Bear Lake Departments. Interest in First Nations’ folklore and song influenced the fur traders who ventured into their communities during the fur trade era. George Keith, overwintering on behalf of Montreal’s North West Company in the Mackenzie River and Great Bear Lake Departments, wrote…
Listening to Early Canada 