Our Story
In 1987 the Toronto Symphony went on its Canadian Odyssey tour performing for six different language groups above the Arctic Circle. The TSO discovered a once vibrant musical heritage brought to the Beaufort Sea by early European seafarers.
With shipping routes closed by Arctic ice, the British seamen spent several months locked in the frozen landscape. They played their fiddles, danced jigs and reels, and infected those around them with a love for fiddle music. The Inuit of the Mackenzie Delta and Western Arctic gradually adopted this new musical art as their own. For decades almost every village or settlement had at least one “entertainer”. But with time, elders passed away, teenagers fell prey to alcohol and drug abuse, and the fiddling tradition began to fade.
Then Andrea Hansen met Frank Hansen (no relative). Frank, an amateur fiddler and Inuvik businessman, intrigued by the coincidence of name, billeted Andrea in his home during the TSO tour. At the kitchen table he told Andrea of his dream to keep the fiddle alive in the North. The two co-founded Strings Across the Sky, a kitchen-table notion that grew into a charitable organization that builds self-esteem, teaches communications tools, enhances reading and arithmetic and oh yes, teaches youngsters to play the fiddle.
Back in Toronto, Hansen enlisted the support of her friend, George Heinl, a Toronto violin dealer and together they began to collect unused fiddles and other instruments. Since founding the organization in 1988, Hansen has delivered over 200 donated violins to the 17 northern communities participating in the program.
Hansen returns three times a year with her brand of teaching magic. Each time, students new and old are inspired by her methods. First she performs Mozart’s classic, Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. She then leads the youngsters through an array of Twinkles, an angry version, a sad version and a sexy version. In a few minutes, students learn the instrument communicates as they do. They are hooked. To hold an instrument and make it “talk” is an experience and much more interesting than passive learning. The experience leads to achievement and perhaps a goal; these are the building blocks to self-esteem. Hansen has witnessed it over and over again. She’s not alone. Parents notice that their children’s motor skills and co-ordination improve along with an ability to focus.
The children learn to hold a violin first by holding wooden spoons. A method Hansen used herself over 60 years ago when she first began to play. Next, they play on four open strings. This means they don’t have to use any fingers when practicing the up and down motion. In turn, students gain an immediate feeling of fiddle playing. By using the open strings with a note pattern and listening to guitar chords, students easily learn the basics skills needed to play a fiddle tune.
“Early on, music is mathematics. It’s a clear form of communication and it releases stress. If you learn to read music, then you learn to read,” Hansen explains.
Nascopie, Pangnirtung Fiord, 1926.
Artist Maurice Haycock (holding banjo) celebrates an arctic Christmas in 1926 with Natsiapik, shown playing his fiddle.
“To hold an instrument and make it ‘talk’ is an experience and much more interesting than passive learning...”