Black History Month without iconic local musician Gerry Atwell bittersweet, say family and friends
'I'm glad he's appreciated. It takes some of the sting out,' says sister of late musician, mentor, advocate
The first time Gerry Atwell's then eight-year-old nephew saw his uncle hit the stage and pound the keyboards to a calypso beat, the young boy knew he was witnessing "cool" in action.
"Not to say my other uncles aren't cool, but he was a cool uncle," Brendan Kinley, now 36, says with a slight grin.
What Kinley — today a musician in his own right — didn't know at the time was that over the course of the next three decades, his "cool" Uncle Gerry would become a musical stakeholder in Winnipeg's black community and beyond.
He is credited for mentoring other musicians, advocating for the disenfranchised and, through it all, carving a path for all Manitobans of colour.
And during the first Black History Month since Gerry Atwell's sudden death in November 2019, his absence is felt as strongly as his presence once was.
It's an absence felt in the musical community:
"He was an elder statesman for the black community," said musician Joe Curtis.
And in the cultural community:
"He left us knowing that we could achieve a lot," said Winnipeg Black History Month 2020 co-ordinator Rhonda Thompson.
And in his family:
"Oh, he was wonderful," his sister, Carol Atwell-Kinley, said simply. "I'm glad that he's appreciated. It takes some of the sting out of this."
That sting of grief is also soothed by the legacy Atwell has left on Black History Month celebrations in Winnipeg. For years, he promoted, guided and nurtured artists and organizers.
Just weeks before his death, he continued to advise, "just making sure that we were touching base with the individuals we needed to," Thompson said. "I'm so thankful to him."
Atwell's connection to Black History Month comes with cachet.
Born in 1959 and raised in St. Norbert, his family roots are woven with a keen awareness of what it meant to be black in Manitoba.
Current statistics say that there are about 30,400 Manitobans who identify as black — a number that's tripled in size in the last two decades. (The Prairie provinces have the fastest growing population in Canada, Statistics Canada reports).
But it wasn't always that way.
In 1898, when Atwell's grandmother crossed into Manitoba from the U.S. as a child, hers was one of the first black families to do so.
In 1905, she was one of the lone black students at a French Catholic convent in St. Norbert — and segregated at the time, Atwell once said, because of it.
"That is probably the worst feeling that you can have as a child," Atwell told CBC in 2006. "Singled out by an authority figure as being different and being treated differently because of it."
Fellow musician Joe Curtis celebrates the memory of Gerry Atwell:
His mother was Frances Atwell — one of Winnipeg's first black pharmacists.
"My own daughter chose to do a school project on Frances Atwell," Joe Curtis recalls, "and she didn't even know it was Gerry's mom until I told her," the musician said.
"It just tickled him that she chose his mother."
For a while, even growing up in the 1960s, Atwell and his siblings were the only black family in the neighbourhood, Kinley said.
He made me feel 20 feet tall.- Rhonda Thompson
Then there's Atwell's musical lineage, which goes back three generations. His second cousin was Winifred Atwell — a legendary ragtime pianist in Australia, the U.K. and Trinidad.
Atwell himself played with hundreds of musicians, in almost every genre.
All the time, he added advocacy to the harmonies he made. When he wasn't performing, he was writing grants for artists who needed a guiding hand through the arduous task — a service he was still providing just weeks before his death.
Heading up hip hop
When he wasn't championing artists, he was championing artist genres.
Decades ago, when Atwell learned about the rap scene hitting New York, he was determined to give it a stage in Winnipeg.
"Beyond the fact that he was the first rapper, he was an advocate for these groups," Kinley said. "Hip hop is the dominant global culture right now, but it was definitely harder back then."
It was harder still for women.
"I was in hip hop and no females were doing it," Thompson said. "It was a genre that was very male-dominated."
Once again, Atwell advocated.
"He [said] 'these are the ways I can help get you down that road,'" said Thompson. "He made me feel 20 feet tall."
Fighting racism with enlightenment
He also helped others stand tall in the face of another cultural barrier — racism.
"The level of compassion that he had for people who struggle with understanding what it might be like to be a black musician — or a black person — was astonishing to me," Curtis said.
Like the time, for example, a local DJ did a racist impression of a black person on air.
"I was appalled," said Kinley.
But his uncle almost always tried to enlighten the person behind the racism, he said.
"I would say 'man, you have way more patience than I do,' Kinley said. "And he'd laugh, like, 'yeah, that comes with age.'"
Black History Month will continue and Atwell's impact on Manitobans of colour will live on, friends say — a sentiment that empowers those closest to him.
"Gerry's appreciated for all the things that he did and the things he was trying to do," Atwell-Kinley said of her brother. "I love it. I love it as a black Canadian."
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