This school year 2023-2024, Dancing with the Spirit spent 31 weeks in village schools and one week in Juneau teaching guitar, fiddle, ukulele, singing and dancing—plus involved many storytellers and fluent Native language speakers passing on their culture and wisdom to the students. We were mostly in the Tanana Chiefs Conference (TCC) region in Interior Alaska.
Alex Troutman, senior producer with Channel Films and a member of the Haida Nation, traveled with us to Arctic Village last December to get footage to make a 3-5 minute Dancing with the Spirit film for our fundraising campaign. And Frank Yaska with the Morris Thompson Center’s TCC Cultural Program helped us with a Honor the Elders Dance on March 16th featuring the fiddling of the Rev. Dr. Chief Trimble Gilbert attended by 400 people. Nina Heyano put together 80 gift bags for all the elders attending. And our musicians also provided dance music at lunchtime one day for the TCC meeting that week.
The Rev. Dr. Chief Trimble Gilbert received a National Heritage Fellowship this year–one of only 10 given out each year which comes with a $25,000 prize! We nominated him for the award and were so happy to hear that he won! He will travel to Washington, D.C. in September with three of his grandchildren to accept the award from Senator Lisa Murkowski. Click here for more information about his National Heritage Fellowship honor.
