INTERVIEW: Nunavut singer inspired by #MeToo
Evidence that the #MeToo Movement has reached almost every corner of the globe can be found in Riit – aka Rita Claire Mike-Murphy, a recording artist from Panniqtuuq, Nunavut. The Baffin Island hamlet is closer to Iceland than to any major Canadian city.
Music on Riit’s debut EP she accurately describes as “dreamy folk pop,” with some traditional throat singing, lyrics in her native language Inuktitut, and inspired – if “inspired” is the right word – by painful personal experience.
“I was in a really bad physically abusive relationship as a teenager, and that was really traumatic for me,” she says in a recent phone interview. “Sometimes I try to remember how I even got out of it, I blocked a lot of those memories out; but I definitely know what it’s like to feel how you think that person is the only one that could ever love you. I know there are other young women in Nunavut who feel that way.”
Riit will be a key “interlude” act as part of Interstellar Rodeo’s “Spotlight on the North” in Hawrelak Park this weekend – playing a 20-minute set between Alejandro Escovedo and the closer Courtney Barnett on Sunday night. (Feist headlines Friday, July Talk on Saturday.) Ritt is also performing with her frequent collaborators The Jerry Cans – also from Nunavut – for the Northern Rodeo kick-off party at the Starlite Room on Thursday.
Riit says that hearing about #MeToo was a “huge” part of why she started sharing her experiences in her music.
“I want to support and empower my other friends, in Nunavut, or all the women, and encourage them to speak out – letting them know they’re not alone, and to always stand up themselves, and never think it’s OK for men to treat you that way,” she says.
The 22-year-old singer says she’s only begun to deal with the abuse she suffered. She only got serious about her music career after she’d moved to Ottawa. It was a culture shock.
“When I first moved to Ottawa for college, having grown up in Nunavut, I was so used to being friendly to people and people being friendly to me,” she says. “So I had to get used to not being able to say, ‘Hi!’ or ‘How are you?’ whenever you see people on the street. Because it wasn’t a thing in Ottawa. Some people were friendly back. But there were definitely people who looked at me like I was crazy, I guess.”
You’d think that in a small Northern town like Panniqtuuq (known on Google Maps by its English name Pangnirtung) there’d be nothing to do but make your art – kind of like Edmonton. But with four siblings, 11 aunts and uncles, and up to 70 first cousins in a place where everybody knows each other, there’s always lots to do, Riit says. “We have such a big family, so there was always visiting and playing and going fishing and hunting, going for walks, sliding, little things like that.”
Now she’s getting homesick.
“It’s been crazy. I never really imagined from being a girl in a small town of 1,400 people I would be here in this stage of my music career. I’ve toured so much last two years, so I’m going to do my own shows and stay home for the summer. I haven’t spent a summer back there in five years.”
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