Vendor display by Carrie Moran McCleary (Little Shell Chippewa-Cree). McCleary noted that Choteau is shared/overlapping territory, but she wanted to emphasize Métis at this event. Visit her website at www.plainssoul.com.
The Métis Music and Art Festival is held every June in beautiful Choteau, Montana, a small town nestled at the foot of the Rocky Mountains. When I wrote about Choteau last year (see blog post below from June 18, 2018), I noted that Métis people began moving into the area in the 1860s. I’ve since learned that the ancestors of today’s Métis were living in western Montana at least two decades earlier, and that Métis were hunting and living in eastern Montana—in particular, the Milk River area—by the early 1820s.
Banner advertising the festival, just outside of the community centre where the event is held.
View to the west of the community centre.
Remembering and sharing the history of Métis in Montana is a significant part of the Métis Music and Art Festival. This year, historian/folklorist Nicholas Vrooman provided attendees with a fascinating overview of the Little Shell Tribe. (In Canada, the Little Shell would likely be understood as Métis; but regardless of how they are named, they have close kinship ties to Métis north of the forty-ninth.)
The most memorable moment of the weekend for me was my conversation with Métis musician Kathy Moran. With her permission, I’m including two Mitchif songs (i.e., sung in a language of the Métis) that she shared with me. Kathy referred to the first as a ‘ditty’ about the buffalo hunt.
The second song Kathy shared was one that her great, great grandmother used to sing. She described it as follows:
“The song is about how the Métis lived many years ago, and probably are still living. They have a lot of trials to go through, just like today. But it tells about how poor they were, and sometimes they didn’t…even have food to eat. And…it compares them to poor little birds. But then the creator, or Jesus, takes care of them just like he’ll take care of the Métis people…My mom sang that song, but I got it from my great, great grandmother. Her name was Marie Swain, and she married…Josue Bercier, and they were up in the Turtle Mountain area, but when they were married they probably just now [were] recognizing the 49th parallel…so they’d go back. They had family on either side of the border.”
Kathy noted that she’s never heard this song anywhere except for in her family: “It’s something that was passed down in my family, and who knows how old it is.” (Given that her great, great grandmother passed away in her nineties in 1967, it must be at least 100 years old, and probably much older.)
Here’s a very short excerpt of this beautiful, Mitchif song.
While Kathy Moran has generously agreed to share this song, any replication, sampling, or commercial use is strictly prohibited and constitutes theft of Métis cultural belongings, in particular, the theft of a Moran/Swain/Bercier family song.
Mark your calendars for next year’s event, to be held June 11 - 15, 2020.
Further reading
Vrooman, Nicholas. 2012. “The Whole Country was…‘One Robe’”: The Little Shell Tribe’s America. Helena, MT.: Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians of Montana and Drumlummon Institute.