Finding joy, no fingers crossed ‘This is me not feeling any shame for declaring I’m happy and feeling fulfilled,’ William Prince says By: Alan Small Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Monday, Apr. 3, 2023

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This article was published 03/04/2023 (913 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

William Prince is getting used to feeling happy.

“It’s a process of unlearning, to be happy, to choose happiness,” the Peguis First Nation singer-songwriter says in an interview prior to the release of his new album Stand in the Joy, which comes out April 14. “This is me not feeling any shame for declaring I’m happy and feeling fulfilled and excited to see where it leads.

“It’s felt at times foreign and almost insensitive when you grow up on a reserve and people are struggling, dealing with poverty, dealing with not having their needs met, the things that propel us through life.”

The reasons for the smile on his face keep piling up.

The buildup to Stand in the Joy, Prince’s fourth record, has led to Prince crossing paths with country music’s greats.

The first happened Feb. 18, his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, where he performed When You Miss Someone, the first single from the new record, and Breathless, from his 2015 record, Earthly Days.

One month later, Prince was among those who performed at a fundraising concert for Farm Aid held at Willie Nelson’s ranch in Luck, Texas.

Prince performed early in the show, but got to perform with the Red Headed Stranger himself, who turns 90 on April 29, for three numbers to wind up the event.

“Mickey Raphael, his longtime harmonica player and friend of my friend Scott Nolan, called me up to join the band, and just like that. It was so special and sweet,” Prince says. “We sang Will the Circle Be Unbroken and Send the Light, two gospels, and Hard to be Humble, a great song. A three-song encore that was just a really surreal moment to share.

“I didn’t expect that to happen. I didn’t expect to meet him… He’s still very nimble, hopping around. I saw him reach down and hug and kiss his little granddaughter before he walked on. That was really special to see.”

But wait, there’s more to Prince’s joy-filled first three months of 2023.

Prince, along with Toronto pop star Serena Ryder, won a Canadian Folk Music Award Saturday in Vancouver for their 2022 duet Sing Me a Song, which was named single of the year.

Prince’s life away from the stage is also a source of contentment, and the photograph on the cover of Stand in the Joy shows why.

It has Prince and Alyshia Grace embracing in front of a grove of trees. The two got engaged over the Christmas holidays after spending several years together.

Grace sings harmony vocals in Prince’s band, and their love was also on display at Prince’s concert last November at the Burton Cummings Theatre, where they embraced at the end of the sold-out show.

“This record challenges me to be less ornery, to enjoy what we’re living here all the time. This is everything that I’ve asked for,” Prince says of Stand in the Joy. “It was ingrained for a long time to not celebrate things wholeheartedly for fear of them going away.

“What kind of legacy do I leave behind? Will my son one day say, ‘My dad was a grouch with anger issues and everything upsets him or was he patient, did he give people a chance, was he generous?’”–William Prince

“The hills and valleys of poverty, of wondering how we’re going to make it next time, I’m not in that place any more. I can really embrace what is now the day-to-day. I can humbly accept the blessings of my life and standing in the joy is very much about that.”

Prince reveals his challenges of embracing the good things in life in the new song Easier and Harder: “Yeah, the truth about love / It don’t come all at once / It gets easier and harder all the time.”

They’re more than cool lyrics for a country-folk song. He’s focusing on joy, happiness and other aspects of Anishinaabe culture’s seven sacred teachings for his life and relationships too, whether it’s with Grace or his six-year-old son.

“What kind of legacy do I leave behind?” Prince says. “Will my son one day say, ‘My dad was a grouch with anger issues and everything upsets him or was he patient, did he give people a chance, was he generous?’

“I’m 37 now. I’m starting to see the importance of just being a good person… It’s hardest now because I do feel it now when I’m falling short of those teachings.

“I want to be grand and I want to be happy. That’s a choice and it’s a practice I’m putting into play.”

Another of the love songs Prince sings on Stand in the Joy is titled Goldie Hawn, which also name-checks Canadian singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell and American artist Georgia O’Keeffe.

Prince became a fan of Hawn’s movies while watching them with his mother, and he references one of them, 1969’s Cactus Flower, in the tune, which he calls an ode to the feminine.

“The women in my life are the reasons behind most of my success,” he says. “I saw the qualities that my partner has and I wanted to name them by drawing on the great qualities that are similar in other great women. I see Goldie as loyal and classy, she’s so funny and those are really great qualities that my partner has.

“Music and dancing and being free in spirit like Joni is what I see in my partner too… And beautiful, something like Georgia O’Keeffe would do, simple and beautiful, and will last.”

“This is the definitive record for me. It’s not how to get over something that’s really devastating. It’s how to enjoy something that isn’t.”–William Prince

Prince will head out on tour of the United States in April and May with the War and Treaty, the husband-and-wife duo of Michael Trotter Jr. and Tanya Trotter. He returns to Manitoba in July to perform at the Winnipeg Folk Festival.

Making a mark in the U.S. is the big hurdle for so many Canadian artists, and Prince is ready for his turn. He believes he’s more prepared than he was in 2020, when his plans to tour the U.S. were scrapped by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“That’s the goal now, to take on the mountain that’s the U.S.A.,” he says. “This is the definitive record for me. It’s not how to get over something that’s really devastating. It’s how to enjoy something that isn’t.”

Prince should have plenty of fond memories from 2023 to look back on, especially if the domino effect of his career keeps rolling on.

“(There’s) a lot of full-circle moments going on right now,” Prince says. “I was 15 years old and I played the first Sunday on the hill at Dauphin’s Countryfest and Lorrie Morgan was performing later that evening.

“And just the other night Lorrie Morgan walked past my dressing room at the Grand Ole Opry.”

Alan.Small@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @AlanDSmall