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Stories   >   Sultans of String perform 'FiddleFire!' at Dubuque IL - Bryant Elementary School / Telegraph Herald

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Sultans of String perform 'FiddleFire!' at Dubuque IL - Bryant Elementary School / Telegraph Herald

Posted: April 17, 2023

3x JUNO nominees and SiriusXM winners Sultans of String create "Energetic and exciting music from a band with talent to burn!" (Maverick Magazine UK). Thrilling their audiences with their genre-hopping passport of Celtic reels, flamenco, Gypsy-jazz, Arabic, Cuban, and South Asian rhythms, Sultans of String celebrate musical fusion and human creativity with warmth and virtuosity. Fiery violin dances with rumba-flamenco guitar, while bass and percussion lay down unstoppable grooves. Acoustic strings meet with electronic wizardry to create layers and depth of sound, while world rhythms excite audiences to their feet with the irresistible need to dance.

Since forming 10 years ago, Sultans of String's CDs have hit #1 across Canada on Top Ten national radio charts, and have received multiple awards and accolades, including 3 JUNO (Canada's Grammy) nominations, 1st place in the ISC (out of 15,000 entries), 3 Canadian Folk Music Awards, plus special guest recordings and sharing the stage with artists such as Paddy Moloney and The Chieftains, Richard Bona, Benoit Bourque (Bottine Souriante), Nikki Yanofsky, Alex Cuba, Ruben Blades, Crystal Shawanda, and Ken Whiteley.
 

With their new album Walking Through the Fire coming up on Sept 22, 2023 release), it marks the most ambitious and important project of their career, a CD and concert of collaborations with First Nations, Metis, and Inuit artists across Turtle Island. The first single is Nîmihito (Dance) is a collaboration between 3x JUNO nominated, 4x CFMA winning Sultans of String and Northern Cree, a nine-time Grammy nominated pow wow and round dance group from Treaty 6 territory in Canada, who have released more than 50 albums over their 40-year history.

the 2nd single: ‘A Beautiful Darkness’ is a collaboration between 3x JUNO nominated, 4x CFMA winning Sultans of String and Marc Meriläinen, the creative force also known as Nadjiwan, who has been recognized in many corners, including Canadian Aboriginal Music Awards, the Native American Music Awards, the Indigenous Music Awards, along with invitations to perform at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics and the 2015 Pan-Am Games in Toronto.

It is the second single off the upcoming Sultans of String album entitled Walking Through the Fire (Sept 22, 2023 release), the most ambitious and important project of their career, a CD and concert of collaborations with First Nations, Métis, and Inuit artists across Turtle Island.

Referencing the title, Marc Meriläinen explains “We were just getting through COVID, and lockdowns, and of course, being in isolation… everyone had that feeling that this was an extra-long winter, because when we started COVID, it was still in the wintertime. And then, sure, we had spring and summer, but those seasons just blew right by, it seems. And we're back in winter again, back into COVID.

And the 3rd single: ‘Our Mother the Earth’ is a collaboration between legendary Chippewa/Anishinaabe Elder Dr. Duke Redbird and Sultans of String. It is the third single of the upcoming album entitled ‘Walking Through the Fire’ (Sept 22, 2023 release), a CD and concert of collaborations with First Nations, Métis, and Inuit artists across Turtle Island.

Redbird was inspired by the idea that every country has a national anthem, yet there is no anthem for Our Mother the Earth.  Redbird said “if people included an anthem to the Earth along with their national anthem at every event, it would serve to acknowledge our identity, values, and sense of pride in the fact that we are all children of the Earth.”  With this idea in mind, he wrote the poem Our Mother the Earth.


Telegraph Herald Elizabeth Kelsey writes…..Sultans of String perform their show FiddleFire! at Bryant Elementary School on Monday, April 17.  The group will present 20 performances over the next two weeks for more than 5,900 pre-K to eighth grade students in Dubuque and Jackson counties in Iowa and Jo Daviess County. Ill., as part of Dubuque Arts Council's Artist in Residence program.

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