The Cedar Presents
ARTIST SHOWCASE HOSTED BY KEITH SECOLA on The Cedar Public Access Channel
Mni Sota Native Music Series
Thursday, July 29, 2021 / Premiere at 7:30 pm CDT / ONLINE
Courtesy of INDIGEFI, Modern Indigenous Music website
ANNIE HUMPHREY
Growing up on the Leech Lake Indian Reservation in Northern Minnesota, Annie lived in a home filled with voices made of thunder and nothing could stop it. Her parents were brilliant people individually. Her father, a singer and musician and her mother an artist and poet. Together they made sadness. Each of her parents taught Annie the beautiful things they knew. They showed her that she carried their gifts in her hands too. This is how creating art and music came about for her. This is what saved her. This is how she lives now.
Things my dad taught me:
skin a deer, set net, clean fish, make maple syrup, harvest wild rice, play basketball, ride motorcycle, go without if you can't afford it, play guitar.
Things my mom taught me:
draw, paint, sew, write, laugh, wonder, forgive
Annie has 4 children and 2 grandsons. She has a handsome, Indian, horseman husband. They inspire her spirit and her art.
DANA THOMPSON
A lineal descendant of the Wahpeton-Sisseton and Mdewakanton Dakota tribes and lifetime Minnesota native, Dana Thompson is an acclaimed jazz and Americana vocalist, multi-instrumentalist and music producer, and has released seven albums.
Dana is also the co-owner and COO of The Sioux Chef. Along with her partner Sean Sherman, she works to revitalize Native American cuisine and reclaim an important culinary culture long buried and often accessible. This summer, the Sioux Chef team will open their first restaurant along the Mississippi riverfront, Owamni by The Sioux Chef, featuring one of the nation’s first all Native American menus. Dana is also the founder and executive director of the non-profit NĀTIFS (North American Traditional Indigenous Food Systems). She has worked for nearly a decade within the food sovereignty movement, traveling extensively throughout tribal communities to engage in critical ways to improve food access and implementing strategies to do the most possible good as a social entrepreneur. Additionally, she focuses her expertise on addressing and treating ancestral trauma through decolonized perspectives of honoring and leveraging Indigenous wisdom.
Dana has been published in the New York Times and the MN Women’s Press, and serves on the leadership committee of the James Beard Foundation Investment Fund for Black and Indigenous Americans.
Courtesy of The Pretendians’ website
THE PRETENDIANS
Pretendians is a Native rock band based in Minneapolis. Many of their songs have societal/political influence and views from a modern Indigenous perspective.
Courtesy of Bluedog’s website
BLUEDOG
The band was originally formed in 2001 by Joni (Weston) and Eric Buffalohead. Bluedog released their debut CD “From All Directions” in April of 2005. The CD was recorded at Oyate Studios in Albuquerque, NM. The CD received two nominations (Best Blues and Debut Recording) from the Native American Music Awards; and was also nominated for the best blues category for the Indian Summer Music Awards. Bluedog released its second CD “A Little White Lie” in December of 2006. This CD was recorded in Minneapolis, MN. The recording received a Native American Music Award nomination for Best Blues recording. In 2010 the band released a single called “Get Up & Get Out” and was nominated in the Best Blues category for the 2010 Indian Summer Music Awards. “Get Up & Get Out” was also nominated in two categories (Best Blues & Group of the Year) for the 2010 Native American Music Awards (NAMMY’s). “Just Living the Blues” was released in December of 2011. This CD was recorded at Untouchable Studios in Grand Forks, ND and produced by blues guitarist Little Bobby and Joni. In 2017, Bluedog’s recording, "Red, White & Blues" was released and all songs were written by Joni, Eric and Alexandra. The recording received a Native American Music Award nomination for Best Blues recording.
The music is influenced by life experiences of Native people. Joni states that “Native people have experienced the blues too. For us it reflects a significant part of life for Native people and our relationship with the U.S. government in the past, present and future. All the pain we’ve endured from massacres, boarding schools, and forced removal from our homes, etc… all attempts to erase our culture and our people. We are still here. Our music celebrates life, the good and bad.”
The band has performed across the United States in support of their original recordings in locations such as: Hollywood, FL (Native American Music Awards), Milwaukee, WI (Indian Summer Music Awards), Toppenish, WA (Yakima Tribal Jam), Minneapolis, MN (Indian Summer Music Festival), The Fargo Blues Festival (2012 & 2014); and Thief River Falls, MN (Last Ride Blues Festival 2009 to 2015). The band has fronted notable blues acts including: The Robert Cray Band, Indigenous, Los Lonely Boys, Corey Stevens, John Mayall, Kenny Neal Band, Lil Ed and the Blues Imperials, Coco Montoya, Ana Popovic, Walter Trout, Shannon Curfman, and the Jerry Garcia Band. The Bluedog band is a five member blues/rock band out of Minneapolis, MN.
Courtesy of ampers.org, Diverse Radio for Minnesota’s Communities
KEITH SECOLA
Keith Secola is an icon and ambassador of Native music. He is one of the most influential artists in the field today. Rising from the grassroots of North America, he is a songwriter of the people. Critics have dubbed him as the Native versions of both Neil Young and Bruce Springsteen. NDN Kars (Indian cars), his most popular song is considered the contemporary Native American anthem, achieving legendary status and earning him a well deserved cult following. It has been the number one requested song on tribal radio since the 1992. In 2011, he joined the ranks of Jimmy Hendrix, Hank Williams, Crystal Gale, and Richie Valens, and was inducted into the Native Music Hall of Fame.
Born in 1957 in Cook, Minnesota, Secola is affiliated with the Anishinabe tribe. He graduated from Mesabi Community College with a degree in Public Service in 1979, and completed a BA in American Indian Studies at the University of Minnesota in 1982. He is married and has two children.
Secola is an accomplished artist, garnering awards and accolades as a musician, a singer, a songwriter, a composer and a producer. He is highly skilled with the guitar, flute, mandolin, banjo, harmonica, and piano, and has played in venues from the halls of the Chicago Urban Indian Centre, to the walls of the bottom of the Grand Canyon. He has also performed at the Olympic Games in Atlanta 1996 and Salt Lake City 2002, and toured Europe several times. Among his numerous appearances he has graced the stages of the Rockslide Festival in Denmark, the Grand Opening Gala of the Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian, The Kennedy Center and the SXSW in Austin, TX, and is a staple at the Grassroots Festival in Upstate New York, North Carolina and Florida.
A seven-time Native American Music Award winner, Secola has earned NAMMYs not only for his music, but also his abilities as a producer, to include The Best Linguistic Recording for producing ANISHINABEMOIN (2007). A well respected musician, he has worked with music legends such as Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead. Secola has also teamed with academics like author Dr. Tom Venum of the Smithsonian Folklife Institute, collaborating on the CD, AMERICAN WARRIORS: SONGS FOR INDIAN VETERANS, and with elders such as Karen Drift, a speaker of Anishenabemoin.
Secola has produced six well received independent CDs, since the early 1990s.
The Cedar Public Access Channel is an online stream that presents creative content planned and produced by artists in collaboration with The Cedar. You can tune in through The Cedar’s Facebook or YouTube.
Facebook link: https://www.facebook.com/thecedar/
YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/user/MadeofCedar
All programs will be available for free with a suggested donation to cover the costs of the program. All artists will be paid. You can make a donation to The Cedar at https://thecedar.org/donate.
Mni Sota Native Music Series is made possible by the Rosemary and David Good Family Foundation.
