Latest News:

Singing Storytellers – Sunjata Story – featured on BBC!

June 29, 2015
We are so proud to have had the Singing Storytellers “Sunjata Story” filmic material previewed in London, England at a SOAS conference on identities last week! LISTEN to Cherif Keita tell us about the story during his recent interview on the BBC!
Hawa Kasse Made Diabate, Fode Lassana Diabate, Professor Cherif Keita performing at the Singing Storytellers Symposium.

Hawa Kasse Made Diabate, Fode Lassana Diabate, Professor Cherif Keita performing at the Singing Storytellers Symposium.

Curating Ethnomusicology/Exhibiting Music events begin Monday, June 15!

June 13, 2015

I’m proud to be a part of the Exhibiting Sound team, and looking forward to  opening of a week of exciting events at Cape Breton University. This Monday at 9 a.m we begin the Curating Ethnomusicology pre-conference workshop!

The first public Exhibiting Sound event is Curating Ethnomusicology, a pre-conference workshop in digital humanities being held at CBU from June 15-16. This event brings together local, national and international heritage and media professionals and scholars, all of whom are involved in the creation of innovative multimedia that attends to music from around the world. The workshop includes a special focus on collaborative research with Indigenous communities. Events and exhibitions, all on the CBU campus and open to public, will include scholarly and industry presentations, practical/applied workshops, exhibitions, performance/lectures, film screenings and other interactive learning opportunities. Curating Ethnomusicology is a prelude to Exhibiting Music, the Canadian Society for Traditional Music conference, being hosted by Cape Breton University from June 17-19 (cstm2015.ca). Follow or join the conversation via Twitter using the hashtag #CuratingEthno for the pre-conference, and for the conference: #CSTM2015. (excerpted from a recent Cape Breton University press release)

Learn more about Exhibiting Sound, funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, at our website exhibitingsound.ca and by following us on Twitter @exhibitingsound ! Learn more about this week’s “Exhibiting Music” conference here.

 

Special Events:

COVERED IN SALTWIRE MARCH 11, 2024! "Tea and conversation with elders at Cape Breton University":

https://www.saltwire.com/atlantic-canada/lifestyles/photo-tea-and-conversation-with-elders-at-cape-breton-university-100946795/

TeaWithElders-FINAL

ARCHIVE OF NEWSFLASH ANNOUNCEMENTS:

TransAtlantic Pilgrimage - Celebrating African Heritage 2024

Watch this space for more details to come! This exciting festival includes film showcases plus dance & music workshops, to be held in multiple locations around Unama'ki:  Sydney, Chéticamp, Glace Bay, Membertou Heritage Park, on campus and off — and every event is FREE and OPEN TO THE PUBLIC, so come and join in! We are honoured to feature dub poet/performer/historian Dr. Afua Cooper and Afropop/jazz/rhumba musician Mark Lenini Parselelo in this colourful celebration. For more information, or to register for the Teacher Professional Development Workshops, please e-mail sound_communities@cbu.ca or call 902-563-1696.

More details to be found under Events.

TransAtlantic-SOCIAL

March 5th, 2023 | Halifax, NS | Julian Kytasty

Links referred to in above image:

1) ICTM DIALOGUES Digital Publication ‘DIALOGUES: Towards Decolonizing Music and Dance Studies’  https://ictmdialogues.org/

2) International Council for Traditional Music (ICTM) http://ictmusic.org

3) The Centre for Sound Communities (CSC) https://soundcommunities.org

4) Canadian Society for Traditional Music (CSTM) https://cstm-sctm.ca

* * * * * * *

Celebrating Black Musics & History in Unama’ki 2022 ~ Don’t miss this mega-event!

* * * * * * *

Exciting concerts, workshops and talks — all part of the Festival of Ukrainian Heritage, co-hosted by Holy Ghost Ukrainian Catholic Church and The Centre for Sound Communities — all taking place at the church and its Ukrainian Hall, 49 West Street in Sydney, Oct. 19 - Nov. 24, 2022. Let’s Celebrate & Learn: Разом … ‘Razom’ … Together! [See ‘Festival of Ukrainian Heritage’ for links.]

Bandura Master, Kobzar & Composer of Ukrainian Descent:

JULIAN KYTASTY IN CONCERT ~ two dates!

 

* * * * * * *

CSC ARTICLE PUBLISHED in ‘Passages and Prosperity’, newsletter of ANSA / African Nova Scotian Affairs.
See pages 16 and 17 of the Fall 2021 issue, here.
CSTM/SCTM CONFERENCE (registration links here) and DIALOGUES EVENTS (registration links here) HAPPENING NOW!
BREAKING NEWS! MONDAY, NOV. 1, 2021 at 5:15 p.m. Atlantic Time — On CBC’s Mainstreet Cape Breton, Wendy Bergfeldt interviews the winners of the Society for Ethnomusicology’s 2021 Helen Roberts Prize. Their article, ‘Fostering Reconciliation through Collaborative Research in Unama’ki: Engaging Communities through Indigenous Methodologies and Research-Creation’, was described by the prize committee as “standing out as particularly significant for our field and our society … This is incredibly important, even urgent work.”
The CBC interview can be heard here.
Congratulations to the co-authors:  Membertou First Nation Councillor Graham Marshall, Knowledge-keeper Clifford Paul, former youth program co-ordinator Shaylene Johnson and CSC director Dr. Marcia Ostashewski.

READ THE ARTICLE THAT WON THE 2021 ICTM PRIZE HERE:

ICTM PRIZE-WINNERS! Congratulations to our esteemed research collaborators & co-authors* at Membertou First Nation on being awarded the 2021 ICTM Article Prize ~ announced last Saturday at the General Assembly of the International Council for Traditional Music.

See it here, at 2 minutes 30 seconds:
* Membertou First Nation Councillor Graham Marshall
* Traditional Knowledge-Holder Clifford Paul
* Former youth program co-ordinator Shaylene Johnson,
co-writers with CSC Director Dr. Marcia Ostashewski

The first session of this course took place Thursday, July 22 ~ inspiring and uplifting. If you’d like to join in the second / final session taking place next Thursday, July 29 at 6:30 p.m. Atlantic Time, register here. We hope you’ll join us!

The Centre for Sound Communities congratulates Dr. Sheila Christie on her recent appointment as Chair of the Department of Literature, Folklore and The Arts, and we also thank her for her many contributions to the CSC as she leaves the post of Associate Director. Dr. Christie has exerted truly magnanimous effort in support of faculty and student researchers. She operates on the basis of scholarship and a teaching practice based on care; her thoughtful, dedicated service to the CSC, CBU and wider communities is greatly appreciated by many, as is her commitment and drive, and her impressive ability to get things done. We wish her well in her next chapter!

Join the Summer Celebration!  Zoom link is here!

Welcome, Dr. Shauna MacDonald, and thank you, Dr. Sheila Christie! Watch this space for word on a special virtual event coming July 15 to which all are invited!

 

 

Registration now open for the Summer Institute 2021 Cantoring Course!

Both sessions of this course take place at 6:30 p.m. Atlantic time.

Session 1 - July 22:  Register here

Session 2 - July 29:  Register here

 

 

 

Check out the CSC YouTube Channel here to watch a recording of the panel from our June 10 event:  Disrupting the Legacies of Colonialism and White Supremacy in Music Schools ~ with thanks to all the participants and registrants in this stellar workshop, as well as to Dr. Dylan Robinson and Dr. Jeremy Strachan for organizing this inaugural DIALOGUES event. [In the coming weeks, we will re-post the video with transcribed text in the hopes of making this ~ and future DIALOGUES events ~ as accessible as possible. Be sure to visit our FB page for news of upcoming events!]

*Coming this Fall 2021!*

Stay tuned for a series of Anti-Racist Pedagogies workshops happening this fall, which will feature a stellar lineup of international scholars and practitioners! For details and registration links, keep checking in on the CSC Facebook page for updates.

New DIALOGUES project workshop to be presented June 10, 2021! Find out more here!

On Friday, May 14, 2021, the Canadian Studies Center, Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington, Seattle presented ‘Singing Sunjata’s Story in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia:  A Mali-Canada Musical Collaboration’. The event featured CSC Director Dr. Marcia Ostashewski and research colleague, culture-bearer and internationally renowned musician Lassana Diabaté in conversation and concert. A link to the event video will be released later in May, but for further information about the project, please refer to the Projects menu selection on this website, or find out more on the Bala website:  https://balafondiabate.ca/