We're looking to the future in our last episode of our first season of One Nation, Many Stories.

Host Matt LeMay is joined by four provincial Metis leaders for a fascinating conversation on what it means to be Metis youth, a youth leader and what the future holds for the Metis nation.

Joining Matt are:

Shaughn Davoren, the Provincial Youth Chair and Minister of Youth for Metis Nation British Columbia

Evan Accettola, the Chair of the Metis Nation Ontario Youth Council.

Autumn LaRose-Smith, the President of the Provincial Métis Youth Council and Minister of Youth for the Métis Nation Saskatchewan.

And Rebecca Lavallee, Youth Representative for the Otipemisiwak Métis Government within the Metis Nation of Alberta.

One Nation, Many Stories will be back for a second season this summer. Look for our podcast team at Back to Batoche in July, we'll be there recording interviews for Season 2.

One Nation, Many Stories is produced by David McGuffin of Explore Productions.

Our theme music is by Metis Fiddling legend, John Arcand.

Tell a friend about this podcast!

And we'll see you next season.

In this episode Matt Lemay is thrilled to welcome podcasting storyteller Jason McKay, the Wandering Metis, along with storytelling Metis fiddlers JJ Lavalee and Jordan Daniels.

And we’re thrilled to be coming to you again from the Tragically Hip's Bathouse studios.

It’s a beautiful 200 hundred year old stone inn along the shores of lake Ontario, near Kingston.

There Matt and his team have been working on a documentary and album with some of the best Metis musicians around. For more on that, definitely check out our previous episode, One Nation, Many Fiddlers.

On the week of this interview, I was joined at Bathouse by Jason MacKay, whose podcast for the Metis Nation Saskatchewan is called “The Wandering Metis.”

It is all about gathering the best Metis stories from his home province.

Storytelling, along with fiddles, is a cornerstone of Metis culture, and with the Wandering Metis in the house the stories just flowed, which is why we had to get Jason, Jordan and JJ around a table, on mics, talking and fiddling.

We hope you enjoy listening to this as much as we had recording it.

For more on the work of the MNC, visit metisnation.ca

Host Matt LeMay recently got to spend time filming a documentary with an amazing group of Métis musicians as they were recording an album of new and traditional songs at the Tragically Hip’s Bathouse studio, just outside Kingston, Ontario. 

Among the musicians there were two of the most in demand fiddlers right now and our guests on this episode:

Alicia Blore is Toronto based, with roots in Manitoba. She played at the most recent swearing in of Prime Minister Trudeau and his cabinet, and was part of the live tribute to fiddle master John Arcand at Batoche in 2023, among her many other accomplishments.

Brianna Lizotte is from Alberta and also a John Arcand protogé. Last year she played for Pope Francis at the Vatican during the visit of Canadian Indigenous groups seeking an apology from the pope for the harm inflicted on children at church run Residential schools.

Bathouse studio is a lovely old 19th century Inn on Lake Ontario. Stone walls, hardwood floors covered in persian carpets, and a studio jam-packed with decades of Hip memorabilia. 

In that environment, working with the Tragically Hip engineer Niles Spencer, the music just flowed.

At the end of the second day of recording, LeMay sat down with Lizotte and Blore in the Hips cozy upstairs rehearsal studio to talk about where Métis fiddling came from, where it is today and where it’s headed.

Many of the songs you'll hear in this episode were performed by Blore and Lizotte along with fellow Métis musicians Alyssa Delbaere-Sawchuk, Danton Delbaere-Sawchuk and Liam Blore 

For more on the work of the MNC, visit metisnation.ca