National Arts Centre orchestra to start Northern tour

The National Arts Centre orchestra arrived in Iqaluit today for the start of a 10-day northern tour.

The orchestra will perform for the first time in Nunavut Saturday night at 7:30 p.m. at Nakasuk School. 

The Iqaluit Fiddle Club and the Aqsarniit Middle School choir will join the orchestra in a school performance on Monday.

Grade 8 student Hope Carpenter is in the choir and said she is looking forward to it.

"I really want to see the orchestra because I think it will be cool seeing all the different instruments."

The orchestra’s first concert in Nunavut will be held at the Nakasuk school gym. The orchestra's request to play at St. Jude's Cathedral was turned down by the church council. The elementary school's gym is the other location large enough to hold such an event.

Laakkuluk Williamson-Bathory is the chair of Qaggiavuut, the society that wants a performing arts centre in Iqaluit.   

"If we had one here it would be a place where Inuit culture and language and society would really be celebrated in a place that’s beautiful, that’s full of pride, in a way it can’t be celebrated anywhere else in Canada."

The tour continues with performances in Yellowknife at the Northern Arts and Cultural Centre on Tuesday, Oct. 30 and in Whitehorse at the Yukon Arts Centre on Saturday, Nov. 3 at 8 p.m.