Vancouver-raised musician named new Indigenous Storyteller in Residence

With the new year comes a new Vancouver Public Library (VPL) Indigenous Storyteller in Residence.

For 2022 it's Eden Fine Day, a musician, author and artist of Cree heritage who grew up in East Vancouver. Having been raised in Vancouver, she didn't connect with her family and community in the Sweetgrass First Nation (where she was born) until she was 14.

"My father took me to the place where I was born and together we picked sweetgrass. He taught me the laws of giving and receiving from the earth and, for the first time, I realized there were people who held the same values I held, even though I had never met them," says Fine Day in a press release.

Some may recognize Fine Day from the local music scene; she's released six albums, including three with Vancougar, during her 25-year career.

Her musical background will be a part of her time with the VPL. One of her goals for the year is to write and record a new album which will be released at the end of her residency.

It won't just be music though, as she's got a graphic novel series she's working on and plans to hold some virtual classroom visits and develop a reading series.

“I especially feel called to share our worldview with children – all children – because in them I see a light that has not yet been doused,” she says in the release.

The annual Indigenous Storyteller in Residence program has been running at the VPL since 2008; last year's was Kung Jaadee.