Every Albertan carries a unique story, and when we listen to one another, we connect and build stronger communities, says Lethbridge-based musician John Wort Hannam, who has been named Alberta’s sixth Artist in Residence and Arts Ambassador.
Hannam is a Juno nominee and three-time Canadian Folk Music Award-winner with multiple Western Canadian Folk Music Award nominations under his belt.
The Artist in Residence program highlights the power of the arts to inspire creativity, connect communities and honour Alberta’s rich cultural identity.
Through the program, an Albertan artist receives a grant to serve a one-year term, as they create an art project that showcases the power of the arts in Alberta.
Through his one-year residency, Hannam will engage with communities across Alberta, attend cultural events and offer an inside look at his artistic process.
Hannam’s residency project Everyone Has a Story will connect unique voices and put Alberta’s talent on centre stage with 10 songwriting workshops in rural, remote and inner-city communities across the province.
Each workshop will conclude with a public listening session and performance, highlighting the stories and songs created during that session.
“Alberta has a vibrant music scene. I’m looking forward to travelling the province and meeting up with other creative people,” Hannam notes.
The project, Hannam explains, is open to anybody. “You don’t need to be a musician. You don’t need to play an instrument or sing or anything like that to participate because it’s about writing your story or stories of your life.”
“When we tell our stories and when we’re open to listening to other people’s stories, we can build connections with people. Through those connections, we can build some empathy and compassion for our neighbours,” adds Hannam.
According to Hannam, the original idea for the project was to get different people in a room to tell stories through song form. “Creating maybe 14 lines, like three verses and a chorus, may not seem as daunting as writing an actual story, a short story or a novella or something like that. I thought, keep the stories into short lyric form.”
In his Arts Ambassador role, Hannam will provide insight into what his days look like when he’s in the creative process. “Showing little snapshots. And that could be anything from a photograph of a song I’m working on or an actual piece of paper with lyrics or a part of a song or it could be me recording a video of me working on a song.”
One of the things Hannam loves about putting on songwriting workshops is he learns a lot about himself and his own creative process. “When I actually have to vocalize it and teach.”
