With varying degrees of intensity, organization and optimism, I’d been trying to get the Six String Nation project off the ground since the summer of 1995 and making mostly incremental progress. In 2002, I’d pitched the idea to CBC Television’s Arts & Entertainment division and got a resounding… yes! Unfortunately, what followed the yes was an endless number of baffling and directionless meetings that made me worry the whole thing was backsliding. But at least I had some development money that was spent on some researchers to start really thinking hard about what might go into this guitar.
In early November of 2005 – at a reception at the Gladstone Hotel – I got into a conversation with legendary Globe & Mail reporter Peter Cheney. He was intrigued by the project and he set up an interview over coffee a couple of weeks later. It must have gone well because he let me know that the piece would be in the paper the coming Saturday. Quick turnaround! Given that, I assumed it would be a short piece in the Arts & Leisure section.
I was at Pearson Airport early morning Saturday November 26th for a flight to Nova Scotia, where I’d be doing a couple of Judy Maddren’s annual readings of A Christmas Carol in Cape Breton over the weekend. As we came down the gangway to board the plane, Air Canada staff were handing out copies of the Globe. There it was. Below the fold on the front page of the paper – continued further on with a half page on A15! My flight was a blur of shock and gratitude and sheer giddiness as I watched all the papers unfolding to A15 in the seats around me. It made me think that – just maybe – things were actually about to take off with the project. Two days later, the federal election brought Stephen Harper’s Conservatives to power, which would soon have a devastating effect.
A couple of weeks later, I received a call from Mark Kristmanson of the National Capital Commission in Ottawa. Mark was the NCC’s Director of Public Programming and the executive in charge of Canada Day celebrations in the capital. He’d read Cheney’s piece in the Globe and wanted to know if the guitar would be complete in time to be the lynchpin of the festivities on July 1st (and the three days of rehearsals beforehand!) Given how haltingly everything was going with CBC Television, and given that I still hadn’t received the money promised me by the Minister of Canadian Heritage (Liza Frulla), I probably had no business saying the guitar would be ready; but I figured if I made that commitment, it would light a fire under me and perhaps others as well. So I said yes, it will be ready!
Various tragedies beset the project in the New Year: PM Harper appointed Bev Oda to the Heritage portfolio and she promptly cancelled the promised funding that so much of my prep work had been leveraged on; CBC A&E punted the Six String Nation project to Mark Starowicz’ documentary department and he decided to take a pass. Throughout this demoralizing period, meetings continued with Mark Kristmanson and the NCC about Canada Day. He was a steady hand. He made me feel like all the calamities were so much noise. The collapse of the CBC deal and the Heritage funding and the blank faces I encountered at meetings with various corporate sponsorship departments made me feel that nobody truly understood the value of this project (which, in turn, made me start to doubt it myself). Mark understood profoundly what the project was about and that understanding kept me upright.
I wasn’t just lucky that I had a sympathetic champion at the NCC. Mark’s understanding of the many links between culture and nationhood were earned not just as an academic but also through years of working on stages from Theatre New Brunswick to the National Arts Centre. His keen sensibilities made him aware of both the extraordinary artists with whom he crossed paths and the politicians, bureaucrats and even spies who recognized the power of the arts to define the national conversation. I highly recommend Mark’s own Substack,
which is alive with the whispers and yowls of that conversation as gleaned from encounters with poets and administrators, rappers and government ministers, actors, dancers, musicians and at least one marketing guru.
Mark had Six String Nation back at Canada Day on Parliament Hill for four years straight and saw that as the foundation of a tradition we would gladly have continued. But Stephen Harper decided to take Canada Day out of the hands of the NCC and move it into the PMO, where participating artists could be vetted for their political sympathies (or, at least, non-antipathies). Still, Mark arranged our appearance at Winterlude in 2007 (where the above portrait was captured), had me participate in NCC staff retreats and even had me as a virtual guest speaker for his class at USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, where he was a visiting Fullbright Research Chair.
As grateful as I am for the support and friendship of Mark Kristmanson, I’m grateful also for our long association with his other-worldly-talented daughter, Kyrie. But that will be the topic of another edition of this newsletter.