Jennie Bice, a Mission-area musician, was commissioned to compose the theme song for the BC Winter Games.
The BC Winter Games is bringing the best athletes to the forefront, Feb. 20-23 in Mission.
But before the first skis even hit the slopes, before the first drop of the puck, there will be a dazzling culture-filled opening ceremony. Filled with drumming, music and dancers, the ceremony pulls together dozens of local artists and a large troupe of dancers.
One of those artists is Jennie Bice, a Mission-area musician and owner of Annwyn Studios. Through her involvement with Fraser Valley arts and culture organizations, Bice was commissioned to compose the theme song for the Games.
“Bronwen Sutherland phoned me last summer and asked if I’d be interested,” she recalls. “I thought, ‘oh, that’s kind of neat.’ I’d never done anything like that before.”
Bice’s focus is on the fiddle, and she’s equally comfortable working with Celtic groups or rock bands. But there were a few parameters that the theme song needed to follow.
“It has to be sports-related, and youth-focused,” she says. In short, it had to be a bit “pop.”
“I’ve never really written a pop song,” she confesses. But she has now, and the result is a song that encapsulates the spirit of the Games. But it also drums up a sense of community. With help from her husband Joe Samarodin as engineer, the song is a blend of local musicians and many of her own music students.
Each of the six main musicians has been into Annwyn Studios to lay down their tracks, including the multi-talented Boris Sichon.
“He can play something like 300 instruments,” Bice says. He contributed to the recorded track with 10 different instruments, from the drum to the didgeridoo.