Jeremy Dutcher (he/they/nekom) is speaking to me through a Zoom window, sipping hot tea in a hotel room in New Brunswick, his long brown hair wild and free flowing in the frame. Jeremy is immediately playful on screen: a little tousled and untamed with a warm charm in his easy smile and creamy voice. While we’re not exactly friends, I get an instinct that by the end of this chat, we probably will be. That’s a big part of Jeremy’s appeal: his presence has a way of pulling you in.
Currently, Jeremy is in Fredericton, lending his hand to the Kehkimin Wolastoqey Language Immersion School, the first-ever Wolastoqey immersion and land-based school, opened by his mother in 2022. Jeremy is a Two-Spirit Wolastoqivik song carrier of the Tobique First Nation in Eastern Canada, and the Wolastoqey language is the essence of his people. Today, their language is at dire risk of extinction: only 100 fluent people remain. Kehkimin School’s mission is to create new generations of fluent Wolastoqey speakers to carry the language and ways of life forward. “There is an urgency to the work I’m doing right now with my music because of this language,” he says. “We’re trying to do everything to protect it and bring attention to it so the next generation will have less work to do than us.”
Language is at Jeremy’s core. Growing up, he was introduced to their people’s native language, and though he did not learn it until later in life, he heard it spoken (and sung) by one of their beloved community Elders, Maggie Paul. “Maggie would always say: when I hear our songs, I hear symphonies,” he says, “so I felt like I was going to take this language and these songs, and we’re going to write symphonies out of them because our music and our ways belong in a high art place.”
When Jeremy decided to pursue music as a tenor and a classical composer, he became passionate about revitalizing the Wolastoqey language through song and storytelling. In 2018, Jeremy released his first album, Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa, inspired by Maggie and sung entirely in Wolastoqey. Carefully transcribed from wax cylinder recordings from the 20th century, tracks on his debut record included recordings of their ancestors over 100 years ago. The album scored the artist a Polaris Music Prize that same year. In his acceptance speech, Jeremy professed that music is changing Canada’s land – and this music is the future of what’s to come for the country. “We’re at the precipice of something,” he said. “And this is part of a continuum of Indigenous excellence.”
The success of Jeremy’s first album landed him on the international map and its stages, a JUNO Award, choice collaborations with Buffy Sainte-Marie and Yo-Yo Ma, and even an invitation to sing at Joni Mitchell’s 75th birthday party. In just five years, he is considered one of Canada’s most acclaimed musicians. This past summer, outside of touring the festival circuit in Canada, Jeremy expanded his focus on going abroad and performing across select countries in Europe. With that came new audiences who didn’t know who he was or what he stood for. “We start from scratch – these audiences don’t know our stories,” he says, “but the response has been really powerful. Remember that folkloric tradition didn’t just happen in North America, it happened all over the world. So there are precious gems in many people’s family stories that connect with what I’m doing.” Jeremy is emphatic when pressed if he feels pressure to perform for new communities. “If we can empower people outside of our communities to be allies towards our communities, it points to a kind of radical inclusivity and invitation to get to know each other, maybe for the first time.” For Jeremy, music is the vehicle that gets us there.
On stage, Jeremy has been called powerful, supercharged, and one-of-a-kind. (“No one has said weird, off-kilter, or unhinged – doesn’t sound very balanced to me, is all I will say.”) That duality is a place he likes to exist in: not only as a Two-Spirit (the Indigenous term encompassing intersecting identities of gender and sexuality), but also as a performer. Jeremy is both traditional and contemporary, classically trained but also not. His Polaris Prize-winning sophomore album, Motewolonuwok, was also partly written and sung in English. Employing a full choir and an expanded orchestra, the soundscape is bigger this time around, as is the genre: Jeremy pushes into jazz and experimental hip-hop territory. “Singing in English, whoa, would not recommend it,” he says, laughing, “but I switched so that there was a more literal understanding between me and the audience.” His hope is that this line of communication platforms his community’s stories of resilience.
This October, Jeremy returns to Symphony Nova Scotia for two nights after his sold-out performance in 2019. While he admits that he’s bound by the orchestra’s canon (“and some rigidity”), the fun part is that he also plans to break the mould with a unique performance done his way. “The 2019 performance was so special – that was one of the first orchestra shows I had ever done,” he says. “I’ve played plenty since, so we’re bringing a new experience: new arrangements from old songs and improvising the setlist. The beauty comes in the cohesion of coming together on a big scale – it will be an incredible show.” Moving from one performance to two, does he have any expectations this time? “That’s up to the audience,” he says. “My philosophy as a musician is if you have something of beauty and love that’s undeniable, then it’s on the audience to receive that.”
It’s been an hour in conversation, and Jeremy has to go back to the school to help his mom. But before we sign off, Jeremy, with that enthusiastic smile, mentions he will make sure his peopleleave me a ticket so I can come to watch the performance. I can hardly wait to see my new friend perform.