Iqaluit (May 17/04) - Nova Scotia musician Troy MacGillivray said the only place he's played in that comes close to Iqaluit was northern Scotland.

"It was almost like it," he said. "No trees. Rocky hills. It's great."

MacGillivray, his sisters Kendra and Sabra, and singer Dave Gunning made the most of their week in the Nunavut capital.

Wednesday night the MacGillivrays led a fiddle workshop. Thursday afternoon they played for students. Friday afternoon they played for elders. Saturday night was their Nova Scotia Kitchen Party at the Cadet Hall.

The Kitchen Party featured set pieces of the MacGillivrays and their guest Dave Gunning singing, fiddling, playing piano and performing highland dancing, along with a few informal jams.

If they can fit it in, MacGillivray said he hoped to do some snowmobiling.

The trip to Iqaluit came about through many connections Nunavut musicians have with the East Coast. Fiddle groups have contacts with other fiddle groups. Students from Nunavut attend Gaelic College at St. Ann's in Cape Breton every summer for music instruction, and Iqaluit musician Jimmie Inch even went to school in the MacGillivrays' hometown of Antigonish, N.S.

"It's like a big clique," said MacGillivray.

Even so, he said it was a moving experience to walk into the Wednesday night workshop and hear Iqaluit fiddlers practising songs from Nova Scotia.

"It was exciting to hear tunes from home," he said.

MacGillivray has been on the road for more than a month, criss-crossing the nation on his "Boomerang" tour.

He started in Toronto, went across the country to Victoria, B.C., headed back to Nova Scotia and New Brunswick then took a jaunt to Ottawa where he met up with his sisters for the trip to Iqaluit.

After the shows in Iqaluit, he wraps up the tour with a few more shows in Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland.