‘I Need You’ topping charts for Indigenous Songwriter of the Year nominee

Singer-songwriter David Laronde is inspired by the winds and waves of Lake Temagami of the traditional territory of Teme-Augama Anishnabai. – Photo supplied

By Kelly Anne Smith

TEME-AUGAMA ANISHNABAI— A singer-songwriter inspired by Lake Temagami sings insightful lyrics accompanied by his soothing guitar.

David Laronde’s talents have him nominated for the Canadian Folk Music Awards 2022 for Indigenous Songwriter of the Year for I Know I Can Fly.

The good news keeps coming. The song I Need You from Laronde’s new album is #20 on the Top 40 of radio play across the country. And I Need You continues to climb up the Indigenous Music Countdown.

Laronde is hoping I Know I Can Fly garners a Juno Award nomination as well. He’ll be in two categories: Contemporary Indigenous Artist of the Year and Contemporary Roots Album of the Year.

Laronde says music for him started with one chord and some music books.

“It all started when I was 15, observing guitar players at my parent’s kitchen parties. This guy would come in and play guitar and everyone would gather around and sing and be really happy and I thought that was pretty cool,” he recalls. “So, I started sitting in those sessions. Then one of the guitar players showed me one chord. It was a D chord and I taught myself from there… My sister had all these (Gordon) Lightfoot records and (Bob) Dylan records. That’s how I got my hands onto recorded music and started playing along to those. Then for a few years, I was playing three or four hours a day, starting in the morning. Sometimes, I’d end up playing in the bathroom. The bathroom had good acoustics. It’s like having your head inside the guitar. It’s neat. You can really hear the musical qualities of what you are playing.”

After immersing in Lightfoot and Dylan, Laronde played bluegrass for ten years.

“Then I started playing blues and blues/rock. Then I came up with my first album, Right City, Wrong Town. That was nominated for Best Blues CD in 2013 (Indigenous Peoples Choice Music Awards).”

Called a spiritual homecoming, his second album, Under the Raven’s Wing, followed in 2015. Now a full-time singer-songwriter, Laronde says music is always what he wanted to do.

“I’m just trying to use my skills to tell a story about what’s going on and hopefully it will help the cause. Trying to make this country a better place, I’ve written on some hard topics.”

Laronde has been working on a writing project on Indian Residential Schools. He is writing songs about the number of children.

“And about everything, really,” says Laronde.

He recalls having dinner with someone close to the family had a big impact on him.

“I said, ‘I don’t know anybody that’s been to Residential School personally, I just hear about these things. He said, ‘I was,'” he shares. “So, I started picking up stories on Residential Schools from that time on. That was about 2013. People tell me their stories. Each one of them is different but each one of them is from the same pattern of abuse. There are so many terrible stories… I’m using music as an art form to paint these pictures to tell these stories.”

His calming sound really came through working with his producer on his last album says Laronde.

“Peter Cliche, he’ll take my songs and music and paint a sound palette for it.”

I Need You was released with a concert and party at the Cobalt Classic Theatre and Laronde played the Capitol Centre in North Bay this summer, too. His gigs include opening for Crystal Shawanda and Buffy Sainte-Marie at the Cobalt Classic Theatre and Susan Aglukark at the Bunny Miller Theatre in Temagami.

Laronde is pleased his new album was able to be released during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We did some music creating. That’s when you put together your own music and lyrics and come up with a good sound. Creating music is one of the most real, satisfying activity that I can think of in life, to be able to come up with something people will like.”

He is inspired through his deep connection with Lake Temagami of the traditional territory of Teme-Augama Anishnabai.

“That’s where I got the theme I Know I Can Fly, by being at the lake and sitting there and watching the birds, and the waves, feeling the wind. All that sinks into your psyche after a while. It becomes a part of what you put out. It feels really natural to go there and create new music,” he shares. “Being at Temagami is at the very end of the lake. It’s just a small bay here. When you get up to the big lake, when you look over the lake, it makes you feel small.”

“My music is grounded in time and space, being up at Lake Temagami talking with the ancestors.”

Viewers can listen to I Need You and can vote here for I Need You on the Indigenous Country Countdown.