I’ve Heard It Said, "You Can’t Go Back"
Well Yvette and I are here to tell you. " Oh yes you can" !
And it was awesome! But hang on, I’m getting ahead of myself....

In mid April I received an Email from the recreation director, Jackson Lindell, in Rankin Inlet, Nunavut, asking if I was the guy who had written the song about the Rankin carvers. I’ve been getting regular CBC North airplay, and still had friends requesting that I be asked to come up to Rankin Inlet and play my music . I was being invited to go to Rankin the following Monday, for a week, to play several concerts of songs and stories from my cd , ‘ Remembering Rankin’, released a year and a half ago. The community was celebrating ‘Pakallak’, a week long seasonal celebration with skidoo and dog team racing, Inuit games, ice fishing derbies, and dancing every night.

Three decades ago Yvette and I left the small Arctic community of Rankin Inlet, after three years spent building a strong co-op, especially taking control of most of the fur and carving trade, the Post Office, Trans air Agency and all municipal service and sea lift off-loading contracts ! But after working for, and living with, the Inuit for three years in the small settlement, we had also established friendships far deeper than we ever imagined......What to do? How can we ever get away on such short notice? Can I still ‘cut it’,
on stage? An immediate answer was required ! As long as Yvette, and Jack my bass man were included, the answer was yes, emphatically !! As I saw it, Yvette and I were in Rankin as a family from the start and I couldn’t possibly go through the reunion experience without her. Plus she plays a nice didge !

We drove to Ottawa a week later, on the 23rd to catch a Monday 10:15 a.m.flight to Rankin via Iqaluit... Yvette, myself, and Jack Hudson , bass player, leaving behind the kids and grand kids, the cat, Molly our Jack Russell, and my business. All in good hands !!

In finalizing the details, I had requested no advance promotion
or hype, and that we wanted to slip quietly into the community
and spend the first evening with the special friends that we’ve
stayed in touch with over the years, now the elders in the community. And, that’s how it unfolded ! Noolook the co-op foreman, and friend, now almost blind, on his daughter’s arm, and Jackson , who had invited us, met us at the plane. We were given the use of an interesting old Jeep 4x4, with a tempermental defrost and wobbly drivers seat, but... believe me,with 20 below weather on the windy tundra, and the spread out townsite of Rankin, we were sincerely grateful for that vehicle!

That evening we spent time with Noolook, his family, and a carver friend, Pierre Karlik, and family, and other friends dropping by, as the news spread by word of mouth, that we were back in Rankin. Radio announcements of our Tuesday and Thursday concerts were broadcast next day as they played cuts from the cd ! Friends began dropping by our room and everywhere we went in the settlement,there was hugging, and laughing, with the joy of reconnecting on such a caring level with so many friends from thirty five years ago. Little kids, children and grandchildren of friends, came up to us on the street and introduced themselves with a handshake and smile.
And let me tell you this about the North..

Smile ! One will get you ten!

After all these years and changes, we still saw the very essence, spirit, & personality of each friend shining deep in their eyes
and smiles, and even remembered most of their names ! There
were only about 500 people in Rankin back then,compared to
2500 now and since I bought most of the fur and carvings, wore
the Trans air Agent and Postmaster caps, and ran the co-op
general store, we knew almost everyone in Rankin ,as well as
many of the carvers and trappers from surrounding settlements of Whale Cove, Chesterfield Inlet, and Eskimo Point. Some of our friends from Rankin moved to these other settlements over the
years and still live there today. One friend in particular Marianne Hapanak, daughter of Leo and Rose Ussak, came sixty miles
by skidoo from Whale Cove to see us when Yvette emailed her t
hat we were coming to Rankin. As a baby we had looked after Marianne for quite a few months when Rose was in Winnipeg for medical reasons. We actually began to think after a few months
of looking after her that we had just experienced an ‘Inuit adoption’.. Thirty four years later Rose and Yvette shared old memories with Marrianne, of their feelings at the time when Rose returned from Winnipeg and came for her daughter. What a wonderful warm reconnecting for Rose ,now 82,Marianne, now 35 with babies
of her own, and Yvette .

In true tradition, Jack was immediately accepted , & warmly welcomed to Rankin, by our friends . It was almost like getting off the plane and immediately entering a dream we had left 32 years ago..... And we hadn’t even taken our guitars out of their cases yet !

Well about 10 next morning we were awakened with a visit from Samgushak, an ice fishing buddy, and deaf mute. Yvette brought
in a round of coffees, Jack came into our room, and sat amazed as Samgushak and I reminisced up a storm in his own particular style
of hand talking, which I had never forgotten. His brother ikeayak,
also a fishin buddy , had died quite a few years ago, was also deaf. Can you imagine the serenity of being out hunting and fishing on the land for several days, with them in total silence. The ‘Fishing Song’is about the brothers, Alikashuak, and myself out ice fishing. Samgusak is still a hunter, fisherman, and sculptor, with a strong connection to the land., and a wonderful person and friend.

Yvette headed over to the Leo Ussak school with a hand full of pen pal letters from our grand-daughter Hailey’s class , and Jack and I went to the Maani Ulujuk school to hopefully find someone to share guitar and bass , teaching books and cd’s, with, that I had spent an intense week preparing. Our wildest hope was to find someone for us to ‘teach how to teach’ our system. !! And we did ... Wendy and Jeremy a young husband and wife teaching team , who were just starting a music program and were in dire need of ‘just our method of guitar teaching’ material. So cool........ Wendy just hugged the books and cds and grinned from ear to ear ! I knew right then, that all the work I had put into preparing the ‘specialized’ teaching material , to share, was well worth it and was in good hands !

Jack spent some time with a couple of their guitar students, showing them a few hot licks. Time flew and soon it was time to get a quick bite and then get over to the main community hall and setup for the evening concert. Did I say a quick bite ? I never ate one sit-down full meal . For the entire week I ate only sandwiches and snacks, squeezed between meeting old and new friends, and their families, and laughing till our cheeks hurt, sharing fond memories from over three decades ago .

Robert and Martha Hicks came by and reminded us that ‘today’ was their 32nd anniversary and that 32 years earlier he had borrowed my brown Beatles style suit to get married in.
Great memories !

Jack bought a caribou bone carving from Amelia Napayok , "a sweet little lady,with an irresistible smile".
The North was working it’s magic on Jack !

We stayed in the new Co-op hotel, and ate in the new co-op restaurant, bought our snack food in the new co-op store, none of which , quite possibly, would even exist , had our band ‘The Fellowship’ not folded in Churchill in 1971 and a chance meeting
with Matt Manchur ,(Ind. and Dev.) from Rankin who offered us a place to live and groceries , for starters, if I’d come to Rankin and
get the co-op goin ! At the time I was drivin’ cab and playing an occasional duo, in the Churchill Hotel restaurant, with my old friend and music partner, Brian Howe. Not a whole lot else happening,
so off to Rankin we went on a new adventure ! Now 35 years later,
on a week’s notice here we are again .

That evening as we set up to play, arranging mikes for Yvette’s
didge, adjusting volumes and EQ’s , for my old Martin and Jack’s bass, we felt nothing but a total calmness and serenity, as the hall filled to capacity with almost entirely Inuit people, many friends,
from years ago , and a few old and new white friends, even overflowing out into the foyer. The lights went down, and joined by Charlie Panagoniak (on a Godin electric guitar that I had hand
carved and gifted to him ) we opened with Charlie’s
Humna My-yuh My !!

33 years earlier Charlie, a well known Inuk singer/songwriter, and I had played on the small Rankin radio station, "on a cold beer night in May" and from that ‘session’ I was inspired to write the Humna My-yuh My song.. The room erupted in applause ! From that moment on and even carrying over to a second concert Thursday night you could have heard a pin drop as I told the stories of the people and events associated with each song before singing it. Many of the very people that the songs were written for, or about, were there with their kids and grand kids, smiling from ear to ear in appreciation and enjoyment. If you have ever been to a concert where you could ‘feel’ the connection between musicians and audience, then you too have been in just such a magical space!

One of my tunes ‘Oh My Oh’ has a droning chorus and we miked Yvette’s didge (Australian didgeridoo) through the bingo P.A. which had speakers all around the auditorium. As the vocal chanting and instruments came from the stage speakers, the didge completely enveloped the crowd from all sides. One could almost envision the spirits of old drum dancers moving through the shadows , chanting and smiling..And definitely a profound experience for Yvette blowing the didge!

Songs like’The Day that Noolook Learned to Fly’, with Noolook
sitting right there listening and smiling, or the story of ‘ The Flag
That Came Back’, (now that’s another story, and I saw Jean Williamson smiling) or the ‘Trans air Song’, about all the ‘irregularities’ to say the least, in air service 30 years ago, ‘Are
We Here to Give or Here to Take’ - written , as I once reflected on
the ‘kablunaq’ motives in the North, and of course ‘The Sign Says
I’m a Carver’, a song about my gratitude to the carvers who taught
me "to see the spirit in the stone and how to set it free", played to
the few of those carvers, still living , and their families , all provided me with spontaneous , some fun ,some sad, stories , totally unrehearsed or even thought about ahead of time. Jack was exemplary on bass and Yvette’s didge playing added a wonderful droning bass line to Oh My Oh, the amplified vibrations certainly being felt by everyone there, including a smiling Samgushak !
(Of ‘The Fishing Song’ fame :-)

We played about a two hour concert, salt’n peppering my original songs with the favourites I used to play at parties and dances, like Bobby McGee, Fulsom Prison, Cheatin Heart, CCR, Lightfoot and Dylan songs., bringing back memories and sharing those memories in song, with all ages !

Then we turned the stage over to Rankin musicians, AmbroseKarlik,on guitar, Henry Innukshuk,with his incredible
drum roll sequences, Joe on bass, and John Araruak, the m.c.,
with Rosalee Pissuk, Noella Nipisar, and Marie Tiktak sharing accordion, and the square dancing began. ! If you’ve never seen a northern square dance , then I’ll share this with you to give you a glimpse of the picture.

There are no callers. Routines of the various dances are learned and danced at an early age. Moves include all the traditional Do-si-dos, alimanys, dips and dives, and lots of creative moves we’ve ever only seen in the north. Between the moves is an intense clogging, step dance in absolute unison , that I remember in the old rec.hall thirty years ago, would cause the entire floor to literally move up and down like a giant trampoline ! The music is all button accordion based, medleys of 3 or 4 tunes, and played flat out, non stop, for over a half hour ! Instruments change hands, everyone kicks back for 5-10 minutes, forming new squares , laughing, joking around, and then ‘ pedal to the metal’ , away they go again ! I remember back a bunch of years when I also, took my turn on the ‘buttonbox’ but this time I bowed out graciously to the younger generation of players. ( The three button-accordion medleys I play on my cd, are each about 5 minutes long, and comparatively laid back, but respectfully no one mentioned that ! )

If you have issues with the Inuit culture or their right to hunt, fish and trap, please skip the next paragraph.
This story is about a reunion of friends and my music about those friends, and certainly not intended to offend anyone.

Next morning , Charlie and Lorna Panagoniak and their daughter, Pitula, dropped in and gifted Yvette and I with a tanned Arctic wolf pelt, only the 2nd wolf he’d ever shot. Needless to say we were speechless. What an honour ! Time for a coffee and a quick sandwich with friends, then off to a CBC radio interview at noon, about our visit, the cd, and our thoughts and observations about Rankin Inlet , then and now . Most prominent to both Yvette and I, was the fact that after so many years, today’s older folks, that we once knew so well as younger folks, are still the same folks and friends.....Just older ! We’ve all climbed our mountains , negotiated a few tight corners, had our ups and downs and slipped on our banana peels, but during our entire visit to ‘one of the fondest places we’ve called home’, we lived and visited in the moment, in the present, pictures and stories of family, and pauses to reflect and remember those mutual friends and family no longer living. No time was wasted pouring over old bad news, hurts, and scars, like we so often get caught up in here at home, when friends meet. The focus was totally on positive, up, things we had in common, and the people and events in the early seventies in Rankin Inlet. We were truly ‘Remembering Rankin’. Young and old, sitting together, reminiscing and smiling alot... .E-e-e-e !

Later that afternoon Yvette took her didge and a bundle of black abs plastic pipe to the school, to share her knowledge on didgeridoo making and circular breathing which everyone got right into. Thanks again to Wendy and Jeremy for their support.

Wednesday night and the local musicians are back on the stage just a-rippin’out the square dance tunes,and again an almost totally Inuit- packed hall dancin’ up a storm ! And some incredible young dancers there are ! Even Jack, my die-hard jazz blues friend couldn’t resist the music. He had a grin happening so wide that his facial muscles ached. The intensity of the dancing and playing is a natural trance dance, just packaged differently ! I always find it amazing how they remember and synchronize such complex patterns considering there’s no caller !

However that night, Yvette and I, and Jack, accepted an invite to a small intimate jam with a few Rankin musicians, Noah Tiktak, Leo Subgut, Gabriel Karlik, and John Araruak, that was to be filmed and recorded just for fun and posterity. Friends Luke Issaluk with his wife ,Louisa, and Thomas Tiktak and his son,William ,also a promising guitarist, dropped in to say hi and enjoy the music. Everyone took turns singing and picking their favourite tunes , in both English and Innuktitut, in an impromptu song circle ! A very memorable, touching moment occurred when I had finished singing ‘the carvers song’ in which I recite the names of carvers, many long deceased. Noah , the son of of Tiktak the carver and friend, thanked me for honouring and immortalizing his father in my song. I still can’t think or talk of that moment, without tears filling my eyes.

What a surprise next day, (now already Thursday), when friends
Mike and Betty Hughson flew in from Baker Lake to see us. In our small two-store town of the early seventies, Mike was the Bay manager and I was the co-op manager, supposed by some that
we should be fierce competitors, but in fact loved nothing better
than to spend a quiet evening talking ‘shop’ over a wee sip of a fine malt scotch from the ‘Glen’ family of scotch. Betty stood up with
Yvette at our daughter Melanie’s baptism , 34 years ago in Rankin,
by Jimmy Makpah, one of the early Inuit, ordained as an Anglican minister. Thomas Tiktak interpreted the service for us.
(In fact, Melanie’s baptismal certificate is printed entirely in Inuktitut syllabics, no English.) And we’ve stayed in touch with them for
over thirty years!
What a warm reunion, and great memories we shared!!
But oh the time was flying by...

Later that afternoon Yvette and I met with Joe from the I.B.C. tv to do an on location interview, and set up lights etc. for recording and filming our performance that evening at eight. I was concerned that in no way would the lighting interfere with my view of each and every person in the audience. Joe was one cool dude that knew exactly what he was doing . Then over to see Barney and Rose Tootoo, to share their Tootoo hockey stories, and reminisce about some of our crazy antics ‘back then’. Like the time Barney switched racing teams from Skiroule to Rupp & I bought his totally unassembled Skiroule 440 for a hundred bucks, buried under 4 feet of snow. I shoveled all the snow and the parts and the gravel into boxes and laid it all out on the warm warehouse floor, for a day, with the heat cranked up. Not a part missing !! Although I believe I may have heard "crazy kablunaq" (whiteman) a few times before I actually got it back together.

Rose gave Yvette some cool Tootoo hockey memorabilia for Devon, our eight year old , hockey great- to -be ,and Yvette gave her a hockey card picture of Devon to put in their trophy and memory room. Devon was thrilled .

Back to Noolook’s for a family photo with all his kids and their families gathered for the pic. What a wonderful feeling to be in the presence of such a large and caring family of kids and grand kids with such respect for Noolook ; all probably wondering if we’d ever see each other again. We knew we’d see them all at that night’s concert though ! I happened to glance at a wall clock............. Twenty minutes to stage time !! My watch had stopped at 5:20 when in actuality it would have been about 700 o’clock.

Yikes, skip supper, get to the hall, then grab a bite later between our concert and the dance. That night, with a full house again, we played all the Remembering Rankin songs and and spun the same yarns as Tuesday night. The crowd again hung on to every word, but now anticipating the details, and outcome of the stories, and responding on cue with laughter and applause ! I remember thinking " How absolutely humbling, to have my songs so warmly received, by the very people they were written for and about, and for Yvette, Jack and I to be given this opportunity to share them with these very friends way up here in Rankin." Neither night could I quite finish (without choking up) the last chorus of
‘ Remembering Rankin - The Song’.

And I wonder if my friends will sing along
Hanging on to every word, of every single song.
And who knows, maybe someday we will play,
Our songs together, just like, the good old days.

Friday morning and it was time to say our goodbyes to so many friends, knowing we’d run out of time to visit everyone , Mike
and Betty, getting ready for their flight back to Baker Lake ;
grateful thank yous to Jackson for the invite to Rankin; a few souvenirs for the kids; getting books for our kids, signed by our
friend, Mike Kusugak,well known Inuit writer of kids’ books, exchanges of Email addies and phone numbers, a last minute
visit from Charlie to give me a tape of his music, that he had just taped from two of his LP’s; Joe, on the tv camera following at a discreet distance for some wrap up shots; last minute dash to a
little gift shop to pick up a special gift for Yvette that she had been eyeing a few days earlier, but wouldn’t spend the money on ; pack
up and get our luggage and equipment, and a newly acquired ‘keelowti’ (drum) from Noolook’s family, into the little Jeep and out
to the airstrip, (I keep forgetting, they now call it the airport ) for an afternoon flight back to Ottawa .

The plane’s engines were warming up. Handshakes, hugs, and smiles all around. And last thing before we walked out on to the tarmac, with a promise to meet again, we said goodbye to our good friend Noolook , who long after we had boarded our plane stood silently watching , through eyes that could not see us, as he had, just five days earlier, awaiting our arrival !

As the plane lifted off the ground, the three of us watched in silence as Rankin Inlet grew smaller and smaller until it was out of sight, knowing exactly what each other was thinking,
but not daring to say a word !

By Ted Schinbein