Digging Roots
Digging Roots are dynamic inspirational performers that combine traditional Indigenous influences, Folk, Reggae, and Blues. In short, this Juno Award winning band successfully fuses Blues and Roots idioms that borrow from the past while firmly entrenched in the now.
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Led by the husband and wife songwriting team – vocalist and songwriter ShoShona Kish and guitarist and musical director Raven Kanatakta – Digging Roots effectively reflects their sensibilities. Their work combines songs of love, protest, and support of the human spirit while confronting the sometimes corresponding travails of everyday life.
Kish and Kanatakta formed Digging Roots in 2004 and released their first album, the embryonic Seeds, in 2006 that hinted at things to come. That promise was realized in 2010’s We Are that put all facets of their considerable talent on display and won a Juno Award – “Aboriginal Album of The Year”.
Extensive touring in support of We Are ensued, with Digging Roots being featured at a number of high profile festivals and venues across Canada, the U.S., Mexico, and Australia. With those travels serving as inspiration, their new critically acclaimed album For The Light was recorded and released in 2014. The disc remains grounded in their Indigenous roots and previously established themes but brings to the fore a certain maturation in their songwriting and approach. The album contains a number of highlights with the title cut, “For The Light”, serving as the centerpiece. The track is sung in both Anishinabemowin, (one of the oldest Native American languages in North America), and English providing a view of tradition through a contemporary lens.
Also notable is “HWY 17” an inaugural winner of the Colbalt Prize, ( a songwriting award courtesy of creator and benefactor Paul Reddick). The criteria for the Cobalt Prize is to “creatively utilize blues traditions within the broad contemporary musical landscape… refresh and enrich blues as an art form”. That sounds like of an apt description of Digging Roots.
