In a time of immense environmental degradation and global uncertainty, the buffalo can lead us to a better tomorrow. After a dark recent history, the buffalo herds of North America are awaiting their return, aided by dedicated Indigenous activists, leaders and communities, including award-winning Cree filmmaker Tasha Hubbard (nîpawistamâsowin: We Will Stand Up).
Music by DFOM Faculty Member Melody McKiver Featured in Film by Tasha Hubbard, Singing Back the Buffalo
Anishinaabe composer Melody McKiver, from the UofM Desautels Faculty of Music, will join award-winning Cree filmmaker and University of Alberta faculty member Tasha Hubbard in conversation.
This Wednesday, February 12, 2025, Anishinaabe composer Melody McKiver, from the UofM Desautels Faculty of Music, will join award-winning Cree filmmaker and University of Alberta faculty member Tasha Hubbard (nîpawistamâsowin: We Will Stand Up, Birth of a Family) at 11:30am in 307 Tier Building in a conversation about their film Singing Back the Buffalo. On Wednesday evening, the Decolonizing Lens film series will host a free screening of the film at 7pm at the Winnipeg Art Gallery. Food will be provided before the event, beginning at 6:15pm, catered by Feast Bistro.
Singing Back the Buffalo is part of Tasha Hubbard’s academic work to support Indigenous narrative sovereignty in North America and Indigenous efforts to return buffalo to the lands. She is a founding director of the International Buffalo Relations Institute and has worked to support the Buffalo Treaty for the past ten years. Making the film was a long journey across the plains for Hubbard. She speaks of following the path of the buffalo with other Indigenous women and an especially moving experience visiting a herd in Banff National Park when the herd matriarchs responded to the women’s songs and stayed with them on their journey. The return of the buffalo to the heart of the North American plains, as Hubbard explains, signals a turning point for Indigenous nations, the ecosystem, and our collective survival in a time of global uncertainty and environmental degradation.
Melody McKiver’s compelling music brings the story of Singing Back the Buffalo to life. McKiver is a well-known violist and composer whose musical work integrates electronics with classical music. A proud member of Obishikokaang Lac Seul First Nation, McKiver is also a member of the Mizi’iwe Aana Kwat (LGBTQ2S+ Council) within the Anishinaabe Nation of Treaty #3. In 2020 they received the Canada Council’s Robert Fleming Prize for a promising emergent Canadian composer. Two of their pieces for solo viola were featured on Marina Thibeault’s 2022 Juno-winning album Viola Borealis featuring l’Orchestra de l’Agora. These two pieces, Ningodwaaswi and Niizh, are part of a larger work entitled Reckoning, dedicated to the memory of McKiver’s grandmother, a residential school survivor. At the Faculty of Music, McKiver teaches Perspectives on Indigenous Music and courses in songwriting, production, digital composition, and contemporary performance practice.
Event details: Wednesday, February 12, 2025
- 11:30am to 12:30pm in 307 Tier Building: Tasha Hubbard in Conversation with Melody McKiver
- 6:15pm at the Winnipeg Art Gallery: food catered by Feast Bistro, followed by free screening of Singing Back the Buffalo at 7:00pm (part of the Decolonizing Lens film series)