Indigenous singer writes song about lost children

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This article was published 08/07/2021 (1728 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Indigenous country singer-songwriter Lucien Spence is a pretty big deal in the Canadian music industry. He heralds from Long Plain First Nation, but sometimes you can find him busking on the grass in front of Giant Tiger on Victoria Avenue in Brandon.

He drives a dialysis patient to Brandon a couple times a week for treatment, grabs some lunch, then sets up his red camp chair to play for passersby.

His voice, like his Ashley guitar, is pitch-perfect, as he belts out country songs.

You can listen to his deep, throaty sound on the Manitoba music website, or Sirius XM Satellite Radio playlist, 171 CBC Radio, and 165 Indigenous Cultural Radio.

“I get played in Australia, too,” he said.

You can find Spence on Spotify, iTunes and Amazon. It’s all indie. He never signed with a label.

In January 2016, Spence teamed up with Dave Rodgers, a well-known businessman and songwriter from Portage la Prairie. They spent a lot of their time writing, collaborating and promoting their songs on AM/FM radio, and Sirius XM satellite radio. Their music has taken them to Nashville and Memphis, Tenn., where Spence performed in seven shows.

Spence has been singing since he was six. At 12, he picked up a guitar and taught himself how to play.

At 45, Spence is no stranger to heartache, which is the foundation to many of his songs. He lost his kids to Children and Family Services for a couple years, and that’s when he turned things around.

“All through my 20s and 30s, I drank and partied. Doing what we think should be going on. That’s what I did for a long time.”

“I used to sing. I was really good at it at that time, too. I used to have to be under the influence at one time to be able to play anywhere. That’s how I trained myself.”

In his 20s, Spence says he sounded like Dwight Yoakam.

“My voice just dropped when I was about 30 years old. So my voice went really low. I was trying to do Dwight Yoakam songs, but they weren’t kickin’ like they used to. So I started listening to Hank Williams, Jr. and Waylon Jennings. I started doing that, then I started singing my own stuff.”

The biggest crowd Spence has sung in front of was 20,000 at The Forks. He believes luck has nothing to do with his success.

“I’m blessed,” he said.

Today, Spence sings about the lost children of the residential schools. And his own children.

“I had to make a choice. Either hang with my friends and just forget about my kids and CFS. I turned my life around and decided I’d do my music. I’ll take care of my kids. And that’s what I’ve been doing ever since.”

That was nine years ago. Today, Spence is surrounded by his seven children and focuses on his music.

He co-wrote “Free the Children” with his producer Tom Dutiaume, about a month ago.

He was fortunate to have someone fund the recording. But, it was the song he wrote about his own children eight years ago that spoke so loudly. He’s raising funds to record that one.

“I saw the children who were discovered,” he said. “My granny was in a residential school. My uncles. A lot of my family went to a residential school. And they talked about kids gone. They’re buried. I thought maybe. No one really knows.”

He said when the news broke of buried Indigenous children in unmarked graves, “I kind of looked at my own children and thought, oh my God, how could this happen? How could this happen to a child? How could they be buried in a mass grave? Just forgotten? It just hit me.”

Spence said he wasn’t mad at anyone, but, “I was flabbergasted. And in my heart, it came out in a song. When you’re not properly buried, you’re not properly let go. You’re lost. You can never be free unless you’re found. And they were found.”

He said he was at work and just grabbed his guitar and sat in the hall and sang.

“I just sang from my heart. Some of it didn’t make sense. But the song you hear. We gotta be strong now. We gotta fight. All Canada has to fight and come to an understanding and healing for each other.”

Spence doesn’t think being angry is the way to go, either.

“I just want Canada to come around as a nation. We must work as a nation. We can’t divide. I want it to be about healing now. That’s what I really want. I want people to not feel bad about what happened in Canada. But to learn from it. And do the right thing.”

If you’d like to support Spence, he said once the song is recorded, any money raised from the royalties will go back to helping children in his community. His song was reprinted with permission.

His Facebook page is Lucien Spence (Louch). His email address is biglouch2016@gmail.com

» kkielley@brandonsun.com