Haida Solstice Album

“Haida Solstice” celebrates and honours the sacredness of Haida music expressed during the shortest days of the year. It also celebrates the Christmas and Supernatural themed music in the Haida language. Join us to uplift and unite our spirits as we collectively move toward the light.

We invite you to join us in a unique experience – come listen, share and experience the songs that celebrate the sacredness of the Winter Solstice. At once familiar and yet altogether new, these songs have been carefully translated into the endangered Haida language, honouring Haida values, concepts, and teachings. As part of the powerful process of indigenizing practices that once oppressed Indigenous Peoples, this album respectfully brings a distinct Haida worldview into music and festivity practiced by many cultures around the world — that of Christmas.

We hope that you will sing along and, through the celebration of this ancient language, transition with us from the dark and cold of winter into the warmth and light in this exploration of healing and reconciliation. 

This album decolonizes the experience of Christmas in a way that celebrates Xaayda Kil, the Haida language. UNESCO declared 2022-2032 to be the decade of Indigenous languages, emphasizing the need for Indigenous Peoples’ “freedom of expression …. and to participation in public life using their Indigenous languages, as prerequisites for the survival of Indigenous languages many of which are currently on the verge of extinction.” Songs are an integral part of learning the Haida language, and language preservation programs encourage songs as a form of learning (Hinton, 2002 at 51; FPCC, 2012 at 26). The Master-Apprentice Program supports learning through everyday activities, recognizing that “language and culture are interconnected” and must be “used in all day-to-day activities which make up a culture”, such as songs (FPCC, 2012 at 8). Every word learned is important! (Hinton, 2002 at xvii).

Elders from both Skidegate and Old Massett suggested the concept for a Christmas album in the Haida language in 2017 when we released our last album. It was their enthusiasm and initiative that underscored the importance of Indigenous inclusion in holiday festivities. We want to share their vision with others and provide a new context to holiday celebrations, respecting the sacredness of the Winter Solstice and the ceremonies that honour traditional Haida teachings as gifts and strengths.

Singing in the Haida language is important work to be done now as Canada seeks to collectively address the injustices and harms resulting from previous assimilationist and colonizing policies. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada has issued Calls to Action to guide this process. Calls 13-17 are aimed at furthering Indigenous languages and cultures. There is power in indigenizing those practices that once suppressed Indigenous cultures: indigenization and decolonization are collaborative processes of privileging and including Indigenous perspectives and approaches. There are two calls to action in the translation of decolonization into Xaayda Kil that we want to respect in this project: Gam yen asing k’aa.ngasgiidaay han hll guudang Gas ga (I will never again feel that I am less than) and Huuy.yad Ga XaaydaGas t’alang kuuyada (Now we all value Haida). Seen in this light, indigenization and decolonization are not undertaken solely for Haida or Indigenous peoples but are part of a shared journey towards reconciliation. 

The translation of Christian and Christmas carols on the album into the Haida language inherently incorporated Haida values, concepts, and teachings. For example, the Xaayda Kil translation of sacred is “supernatural”, and “saints” is “peaceful one”. Xaayda Kil and English are very different languages with very different phrasing, requiring a careful approach to the songs and translations. From Terri-Lynn’s work with Haida music since 1978, we learned that there is a separate “language” for songs, which differs from daily language and the formal language spoke in Potlatch. We were fortunate to work with the Skidegate Haida Immersion Program to translate these songs.

As an advocate for Haida culture, Terri-Lynn initially resisted a Christmas album because foreign and Christian worldviews are reflected in Christmas songs. For many people Christmas feeds into consumerism that underlies colonialism and the exploitation of Indigenous lands. Yet, like other Indigenous Peoples, the Haida outwardly adopted Christianity as one way to practice Haida ceremonies “underground” and keep them alive (Edenshaw-Davidson & Blackman, 1982). For example, Christmas dinners allowed Haida families to maintain aspects of traditional Haida discourses and potlatches. Terri-Lynn’s late father, Godfrey (Collinson) Williams (1919-1994) provides a further example of embracing Christmas carols. He attended residential school, and Christmas was a time to share food and gifts that he didn’t have as a youth. Christmas carols were a medium for his spirit to sing in a time when traditional songs, music, and Xaayda Kil were suppressed.

At a spiritual level, this album is a way to foster a connection with previous generations of Haida, and Indigenous Peoples everywhere, who sang Christian hymns and carols but yearned to be able to express themselves in their language. The members of sGaanaGwa are blessed with safe and loving homes, where we celebrate Christmas and sing carols together. We treasure those memories and want to covey the feelings that can be found at Solstice, on the land and waters, and in Potlatch.

We hope that this music will bring joy and healing to the Elders. We hope that it will help free the spirits of Haida and Indigenous Ancestors who yearned to sing our traditional music but could not in the face of the cultural suppression and the Potlatch prohibition. We also hope that it will help affirm for youth that the Haida language is living and part of the society of Canada.

We greatly appreciate the support of the First Peoples’ Heritage, Language and Culture Council and their partners in the Indigenous Arts Program, Creative BC and the Province of British Columbia to make this album.