This week, the first of two FunDrive episodes recorded live at CJSR: what art can tell us about the past? Author, rapper and broadcaster Wab Kinew will be speaking about his new memoir The Reason You Walk. And University of Saskatchewan Professor Yin Liu will join us to talk about the surprising origins of the blank spaces between our words.
This episode first aired on September 23, 2015.
This week: Gatekeepers. We talk to Weird Canada Executive Director Marie Leblanc Flanagan and Edmonton author Leif Gregerson about the tradeoffs for artists who want to go around labels and publishers.
This episode first aired on September 16, 2015.
This week we’re out of reach, off the map. What drives us off the grid? We talk to Marc Clarabut, who’s just embarking on a life in the wild near Ontario’s immense Algonquin Park. And we head to the West Coast to talk to Judith Wright, who’s lived off the grid for decades on a BC island but still manages to make it to her monthly book club (by boat).
This episode first aired on September 9, 2015.
This week’s episode is one of those old questions: what’s the point of suffering? We speak to Canadian author Marina Endicott about her pun-tastic novel Close to Hugh, and her characters’ struggle to figure out how we live in the knowledge of death and suffering and not collapse from sadness.
Then we talk to dancer and Pique Dance Centre instructor María Valencia Alvarez about yearning for a baby brother, being shipped off to boarding school, and growing up fast.
This episode first aired on August 26, 2015.
This week: What’s authentic? Emmanuel Jal was born in South Sudan and became a child solider at the age of 7. He’s now become a global citizen through his work as an activist, hip-hop artist and storyteller. We talked to Emmanuel about how he tries to stay true to himself and where he comes from.
And we dive deep into the debate about cultural appropriation of Indigenous art and culture. Cold Lake First Nation artist Dawn Marie Marchand joins us to talk about the lengths she goes to make her art respectfully, and whether Edmontonians really should #boycottyegarts, as Metis writer and academic Zoe Todd has advocated on her blog.
This episode first aired on August 19, 2015.
This week: do you know your neighbours? We take a look at a long-standing Edmonton institution whose business is all about full exposure: the Chez Pierre strip club. And we ask how the Edmonton Folk Festival keeps its neighbours happy right in the middle of the city. Festival Producer Terry Wickham and a neighbour named Marilyn weigh in.
This episode first aired on August 6, 2015.
This week: what do you do when you get to the end… and it’s not the end? We talk to Callahan Connor (aka rapper C-Command) about the frustrating charms of Super Mario Brothers. Then former Rent star Christian Mena tells us how he ended up back in Edmonton running three snappy restaurants. And LJ Tresidder of Enchanted Fables tell us what it’s like to put kids in the middle of their own princess story.
This episode first aired on July 29, 2015.
This week: Boot Camp Poets. How could rap or poetry help inmates at the Edmonton Remand Centre find a different life, and what roadblocks might be in their way? This is the second half of a two-part documentary speaking to inmates in the Edmonton Remand Centre’s Boot Camp unit.
In this episode, John Howard Society’s Howie Hoggins speaks to us about what’s ahead for men in the Boot Camp unit transitioning out of prison. Métis writer and researcher Patti Laboucane-Benson tell us what her graphic novel The Outside Circle has to say about why so many Aboriginal people end up behind bars. And we hear more poetry from Boot Camp unit inmates Joshua Charles Thom, Michael Nelson, and Nathan Laboucan.
This episode first aired on July 15, 2015. Listen to Part 1 here.
This week: Boot Camp Poets. How do folks end up behind bars at the Edmonton Remand Centre – and how could rap or poetry help them find a different life? On this week’s show, we speak to inmates in the Edmonton Remand Centre’s Boot Camp unit for the first half of a special two-part documentary.
The men we interviewed for this episode include Robert Deschamps, Donnie Kleppe, Dillon McKenzie and Chris Pruden.
This episode first aired on July 8, 2015. Listen to Part 2 here.
This week: what is art worth? We headed to Edmonton’s Found Festival to ask you to compare some famous and not-so-famous artwork we dragged along. And we speak to former street artist Jamie Law about a 2012 police raid of his art show – a raid that still asks questions about how we decide what’s art, and what’s a crime.
Check out the artwork we asked folks at Found Festival to compare and let us know which one you think is the most valuable (and no, the Van Gogh is sadly not the original):
This episode first aired on July 1, 2015.
All That Matters 