Iqaluit (July 17/06) - A Nunavummiut throat singer and songwriter has brought the joys - and the sorrows - of life in the North to the world in her first CD.

"Nipiga" (My Voice) is the first release from Kugluktuk's Angela Hovak Johnston, and is over seven years in the making.

Kugluktuk's Angela Hovak Johnston poses for her first CD, "Nipiga" (My Voice). The CD includes throat singing, bits of Maritime folk and deeply personal lyrics, blended together. The album was over seven years in the making. - photo courtesy of Angela Hovak Johnston

Now based in Bridgewater, N.S., Hovak Johnston said the album is, in part, about finding her own voice as a performer and a songwriter.

"When you're in the public eye there's always good and bad," she said. "I wasn't ready for that. I feel like I'm a whole person now. It's like I'm ready for anything."

Of course, life had a hand in the CD's long gestation period as well, as Hovak Johnston has also spent the last seven years raising her sons, Braden, Brian and Bailey.

She said the album is 11 tracks of throat singing and folk singing, with a healthy dose of Inuit drumming and Celtic folk mixed in.

The album is primarily in Innuinaqtun, with a pair of songs in English.

It includes a translated version of "Amazing Grace."

The song's topics range from the personal to the political, such as "Iviurnautiga" (Sweet Heart), a lullaby she wrote seven years ago for her first son and "Taimak" (Stop), which is about abuse.

"I'm a survivor of abuse," she said, a fact that has inspired her to use this song to help others.

To that end, some of the album's proceeds will go towards care packages for a women's shelter in Cambridge Bay, where she went to school as a child.

"There's so much to do up North. I just want to help."

Beyond this, Hovak Johnston said this album is a way for her to establish a legacy for her family.

"It's for my boys, to help them carry on the Inuit culture and learn some of their music."