Following a well-received performance during the Celtic Colours International Festival earlier this month, Mi’kmaw fiddler and singer Morgan Toney has released his first single, “Ko’jua”.
Toney joined Ashley MacIsaac for Jerry Holland’s “My Cape Breton Home”, the opening number of the Celtic Colours Right At Home concert on October 9. He went on to sing and play a variety of songs and tunes throughout the concert, including “Ko’jua” and “The Mi’kmaq Honour Song” with Mary Beth Carty. The live-streamed concert has racked up 75,000 views on Facebook and is available to view until the end of October here.
The twenty-one-year-old performer, originally from We’koma’q First Nation, has lit a spark in the Mi’kmaq Nation. The fiddle is a very strong part of his identity as Mi’kmaq and players like Lee Cremo, Moonie Francis, Vincent Joe, Wilfred Prosper, Sr. and Wilfred Prosper, Jr. have influenced his fiddle playing. After picking up the fiddle by accident during his time at Cape Breton University, Toney decided to take the fiddle more seriously when he found out that three of his great uncles played. Wanting to make sure that the fiddle remains strong in his family, and that their legacies live on, he has since taken lessons from Stan Chapman and, more recently, from Kyle MacNeil.
The “Ko’jua” is a Mi’kmaq dance song that has been played in Unama’ki for a very long time and there are different styles to dance the “Ko’jua” for every Mi’kmaq community.
“The lyrics have evolved,” says Toney. “An elder had told me that the idea of the song is about a dog that has a broken leg. The dance itself is very unique, because in a way, you become the animal that has the broken leg. It shows as you dance in a circle”.
Toney’s version of “Ko’jua”, produced by Keith Mullins at Barn Breagh Studios in Baddeck, gives the old song a modern arrangement, and has inspired the pair to work together on an album fusing Mi’kmaq and Celtic roots into something fresh and new. “Ko’jua” is available through a go fund me campaign created to help support making the album.
Along with his fiddling, Toney sings and writes in Mi’kmaq and English using lyrics inspired by these two longstanding traditions. Cape Breton’s First Nations communities have long been steeped in the Celtic music tradition and now Morgan Toney is carrying this torch.
