Music library Nagamo Publishing officially launches

By Adam Laskaris

TORONTO— The world’s first Indigenous-created music production library is open for business.

Known as Nagamo Publishing, the creation is a subsidiary of Dadan Sivunivut, a holding company created by Aboriginal Peoples’ Television Network (APTN).

Nagamo’s reach features a library of Indigenous music to be licensed for commercial use, as well as a roster of musicians available for producers to connect and collaborate with.

After what Co-Creative Director Nigel Irwin described as a “soft launch” in 2020, the company is now in full operation as of late January.

“What’s unique about this library is that we’re taking music that has deep, traditional roots and finding respectful ways for our composers to remix these sounds with their own contemporary spin,” said Oliver Johnson, Artistic Director of Bedtracks in a press release.

Bedtracks is another music library that has been a key partner in the process of Nagamo’s creation.

Nagamo is also sponsored by imagineNATIVE and currently has partnerships with CBC, eOne, Corus Entertainment, and a number of independent producers.

“We kept finding that our clients wanted authentic Indigenous music for various projects and we realized there wasn’t a centralized place to find traditional and contemporary pre-cleared music of this kind. We wanted to change that,” Johnson said.

Nagamo’s website offers pricing starting at $50 per track for student projects and film festivals, with tiered pricing available for various levels of work. Currently, there are just under 200 different tracks available in the library, in genres ranging from hip-hop to traditional throat singing.

Irwin himself has spent about a decade in the arts industry. Now 28, Irwin has, in his own words, “worn a lot of hats” in creative works, working as a singer-songwriter, producer, as well as holding a background in theatre.

“Nagamo is a great way to pivot and find a new outlet for my creativity and musicianship,” said Irwin.

Born in Toronto to a single mother and moving around Ontario a lot as a child, Irwin described his own path to self-understanding his Indigenous roots as “a lifetime journey.” Irwin’s father, who he reconnected with as a teenager, hails from the Enoch Cree Nation in Alberta.

“It’s a little bit about finding out about yourself and it’s a bit about what’s going on in Canada in general,” he said.

Returning to Toronto as a teenager to attend Ryerson University, Irwin described how he learned more about Indigenous identity, culture, and history in Canada’s largest city.

“In Toronto, you just have to seek it out,” he said. “It’s funny when you don’t live directly with a community, you’re kind of tasked with creating community, and finding community and that comes from many different places. I would go to the Native Canadian Centre, I would do language lessons, I would do drum lessons, I was in the middle of ceremony, I would meet Elders.”

While most of his time and effort is focused on Nagamo, Irwin said he is also working on an upcoming musical project that involves remixing various Indigenous voices and sounds.

“I think it’s the most authentic version of myself,” he said.

Currently, Nagamo’s efforts are focused on building up their network within Canada; however, Irwin says the long-term future of the company is to work with worldwide clients.

“We have a bit of a lofty goal— we have a global vision here,” Irwin said. There’s Indigenous music all over the world. We’re looking to be that access point where we can connect all those voices and tell those stories.”

In the short-term, it is very much a waiting game to be able to have the post-COVID-19 pandemic music experience return in all its forms — live shows, jam sessions, in-person recording and many other day-to-day events that Irwin described as “decimated” over the past year.

“It’s been a bit of an up and down, but we’ve persevered through all that and have managed to get Nagamo off the ground,” Irwin said.

Irwin said the company’s office, which has been mostly unoccupied due to various local restrictions, is also looking for a more permanent Toronto location.

“We’re really eager to get back into the communal spaces,” he said. “We really want to find more Indigenous composers and creators.”