SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - The work Yellowknife songwriter Dana Sipos is doing to connect with audiences in other parts of Canada on tour and online is going to get a big boost later this year.

Songwriter Dana Sipos and her enthusiastic guide Courtney Rose Keevik pose for a picture on the land near the famed Tuktoyaktuk pingos last spring. Sipos has been commissioned to compose a song about the Tuk landmarks after winning the Great Canadian Song Quest contest hosted by CBC Radio 2. She performs at 8 p.m. on Monday at Northern United Place as the opening act for Canadian recording artist Barney Bentall. - photo courtesy of Dana Sipos

The 25-year-old performer is scheduled to debut a new Northern song during a concert at the Glenn Gould Studio in Toronto on Dec.15. The song will broadcast live around the country.

Sipos will share the stage with many of the country's best known young and emerging recording artists, including Kim Barlow from the Yukon, Lucie Idlout from Nunavut, Hawksley Workman from Ontario, Martha Wainwright from Quebec, Joel Plaskett from Nova Scotia and Hey Rosetta from Newfoundland and Labrador.

The musicians are all winners of the Great Canadian Song Quest contest on CBC Radio 2. Online voters chose Sipos to represent the NWT in song last week. They also selected the theme she will write and sing about – the Tuktoyaktuk pingos.

"They are quite something from a scientific point of view," said Tuk-born guitarist Greg Nasogaluak of the Yellowknife-based blues-rock band, Priscilla's Revenge.

Pingos are natural formations created when ground water freezes and pushes permafrost up into a mound. Tuktoyaktuk has about 1,350 of them, including the second tallest pingo, which stands 49 metres high and stretches 300 metres along its base.

"I hope Dana has an opportunity to capture the pingos in a song and I hope she has the resources to do the North proud," Nasogaluak said. "I like her music and I'm sure that she'll do great. This might be a good opportunity for her to go (to Tuktoyaktuk). I'm sure there would be a lot of elders in the community who could talk to her about the significance of the pingos. For me, and I’m sure for many people from Tuktoyaktuk, when we see the pingos we see home."

Sipos is planning to head to Tuk next week. It will be her second visit to the community since last spring.

"I loved it there," Sipos said. "It's a really special place. It's so vast and beautiful and the people are so kind. I look forward to going back to get re-inspired by the pingos and to talk to the people about what the pingos mean to them."

She said she will pull together a small concert for the community while she is in town. In the meantime, Sipos continues to concentrate on building her music career.

"I'm just trying to ride the wave here a bit, movin' and shakin'," she said.

This weekend Sipos is participating in the third annual business of the performing arts workshop series hosted by the Northern Arts and Cultural Centre. It is the second year Sipos has participated in the professional development initiative for Yellowknife artists.

On Monday at 8 p.m., Sipos is on stage at Northern United Place opening for folk and roots influenced Canadian recording artist Barney Bentall.

"I'll be interested to see (Sipos perform)," Bentall said. "It should be a fun night."

The concert will broadcast later this year on CBC North's revamped weekend morning program, Skinner at Random.