By Emily R. Zarevich, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Joe Lapinski is a musician and producer who hails from St. Catharines. As an intrepid artist, his keen focus is on using the power of music to develop community and bring people together. He currently runs Wow Recording Studios & Creative Music Space, located in his hometown, and is the co-founder of the Niagara-St. Catharines region’s In the Soil Arts Festival. Lapinski’s ability to organize successful events, bring together bands, and execute compelling storytelling through music led to him being invited by the Burlington Performing Arts Centre to be the musical director of The Music of The Secret Path project, set to be performed at the venue on Friday, October 10 at 7:30 p.m.
The Music of The Secret Path is a multimedia story about the shameful side of Canada’s history that is no longer being kept secret. First composed in 2013 by The Tragically Hip’s Gord Downie, The Secret Path follows the real-life, desperate attempt by twelve-year-old Ojibwe (Anishinaabe) boy Chanie Wenjack to escape the Cecilia Jeffrey Indian Residential School near Kenora, Ontario. Wenjack undertook the impossible task of walking four hundred miles in the freezing cold to get back home to his family. The brutal weather and starvation took his life on October 22, 1966. Downie read about Wenjack’s short life and his death in a 1967 issue of Maclean’s and was haunted enough by the tale to write ten poems that were later translated into music.
Offstage, Lapinski is open to having a candid conversation about reconciliation in Canada and the tragic story that The Secret Path is trying to tell.
“It’s heartbreaking. It’s simply heartbreaking. Just thinking about it makes me feel despair and anger,” he said, when asked about the challenges of performing the story of a young Indigenous boy who died in such a cruel manner.
“Chanie Wenjack’s story is just one of thousands and thousands of stories. The challenge of learning these songs Gordon created has led me down many paths of just wanting to learn more and educate myself more. I feel that something I can do as a white settler on Turtle Island is to help tell this story.”
“The story itself is so heavy, and it’s real,” Lapinski continued. “It happened, in our country. I’m having many emotions that run through me, where I’m questioning my Canadian identity. It’s being challenged, and I think that’s a good thing. It needs to happen.”
Lapinski believes music is a key component in the campaign towards reconciliation in Canada. Gord Downie’s own activism for Indigenous rights is an inspiration.
“Gord Downie was a well-known Canadian musician thanks to his time in The Tragically Hip. He knew that if he performed something or wrote a song, there would be a lot of people who would want to hear it and listen to it. Releasing The Secret Path was a good way for people who are fans of his to hear this story that they might not have heard otherwise.”
“I know from attending Pow Wows and other First Nations events that music is huge,” Lapinski shared, on his own role in promoting reconciliation in Canada through his talents. “Music has been used for centuries to tell stories. I love that music can be used to tell a story and also help put the listener in an emotional space that may lead them to feel.”
Lapinski invites local musicians from the GTHA to perform with him on stage on the night of October 10. Interested parties can send their renditions of Tragically Hip and Gord Downie songs to Nicole Harris, BPAC’s education and outreach coordinator, at nicole.harris@burlington.ca.
Tickets for The Music of The Secret Path at BPAC can be bought here. Those who are interested in contributing to The Gord Downie and Chanie Wenjack Fund can make a monetary donation here. For more information about how The Secret Path was put together and how it evolved into a renowned multimedia endeavor, visit the website here.
