THUNDER BAY — As they get ready to celebrate the fifth year of Wake the Giant, students at Dennis Franklin Cromarty are helping to write music for the big event.
Students will participate in a two-day workshop with artist DJ Shub to help create a song that will be featured at the music festival.
DJ Shub, aka Dan General, is excited to work with the students.
"I think this opportunity is huge, especially when it ties into something like Wake the Giant and being able to get on stage in front of that many people."
He also noted it's special to see so many Indigenous names on a concert poster.
"Very rarely do you see festivals where the top half is headliners and then right below it is Indigenous artists. A lot of the times, our names as Indigenous artists aren't up in the forefront like that, and just to have something like that alone on a poster - it means the world to Indigenous youth.
"It means the world to Indigenous artists. Thunder Bay just gets it, and the community that is here loves the music. They don't see where people are coming from; they just hear the music and hear the good music festivals."
Greg Chomut is a teacher at Dennis Franklin Cromarty and an organizer of the festival.
"This year, one of our goals from this is to write some music with DJ Shub and maybe see our students taking the stage at the festival in front of Thunder Bay show, showing off their talents."
Tessa Harper, a Grade 12 student, was excited about the workshop.
"[Not many] people get the kind of opportunities like this to be so close to people who do all of this cool stuff. We've only been here about an hour, and I didn't know there was so much to DJing. I've already learned quite a bit just being here so far. I'm excited to keep learning and working with everybody else."
The festival is expected to announce this year's lineup in early May for the Sept. 14 event.
