Understanding the behaviour of ice and the cultural stresses and frustrations as well as the happiness it brings may be an underestimated characteristic of your average northerner.
Andrea Bettger, Yellowknife’s master fiddler is releasing a new single called Thin Ice on May 13 which will hopefully speak to how ice is part of everyday life while living in Yellowknife Bay.
“We are really trying to explain to people that don’t live here how we spend a lot of time from the winter months to early June travelling the frozen lake from walking to using a snow machine and then to driving,” she said.
“Knowing how thick and knowing how much weight it can support and thickness at different locations on water” as well as the emotions of “trepidation and weariness” from travelling ice are all part of living in the north that the song tries to capture, Bettger explained.
“The piece will also be interspersed with happy musical moments and depictions of the joy of pond hockey and skiing and dog sledding and being around the snow castle,” she added. “So it will be two moods presented instrumentally.”“
The song itself entirely instrumental with no words and is accompanied by Bettger’s band of guitarist Ben Russo, bassist Pat Braden and drummer Al Bee.
he song itself is sort of instrumental song and no words. Captures mode of trepidation and weariness and navigating of dangerous id
Bettger said that most of the footage was shot on Yellowknife Bay in April 2021 when it was was still really cold at -20 C with six feet of ice.
“That time of season is generally when conditions are changing,” she said chuckling. “But people will see lot of footage on Dettah Ice Road and some beautiful shots of the area in the sunshine by videographer Keith Robertson.”
Other vignettes will include a performance in a decrepit snow castle that is leaning and melting away, shots of pond hockey and of performers pulling a canoe across thin ice.
Her last single recording, Yellow Snow, was nominated for a Canadian Folk Music Award in the fall of 2021.
Her last two major album recordings were Bush Chords from the late summer of 2020 and Snappy Day in 2018.
Looking ahead, Bettger said she expects to release a second single called ‘Blue Skies and I’ before the end of June. She is also applying for government funding to record a new full-length album in the fall where she will collaborate with other NWT Arts artists.
People are asked to visit the Andrea Bettger Youtube page and hit ‘Set Reminder’ to watch the launch of Thin Ice’s video premiere at 4 p.m. On Friday May 12.
The tune will also be available on most music digital playing apps including Apple, Spotify, and Google Play.
More information can be found at Bettger’s web page at andreabettger.ca.