Tanya Tagaq’s mixtape

Available for 26 days

Verity Sharp shares a mixtape crafted exclusively for Late Junction by the internationally renowned artist, avant-garde composer, singer and author, Tanya Tagaq. Tagaq hails from the Arctic territory of Nanavut and was raised in Cambridge Bay, a remote island town inaccessible by road, where she was introduced by her Inuk mother to one of the local community’s most loved past-times: throat-singing. Traditionally, the music would take the form of good-natured vocal combat in which two women would square off, face-to-face, and produce heaving, guttural vocal sounds aimed in each other’s direction. Tagaq later metamorphosed this community tradition whilst at secondary school, turning it into a solo vocal medium, and has since used it as a vehicle of shattering emotional power, to unleash personal and political expression. Her work has long been a force which aims straight at the jugular of systems of oppression, bidding for indigenous rights, environmental and colonial justice, and for victims of sexual abuse. She has been awarded numerous honorary doctorates, is a member of Order of Canada, and has been the recipient of prestigious prizes, including Polaris Prize and the Juno Award. She is a best-selling author of It Bears Repeating and the mytho-biography, Split Tooth, which has been transformed into a performance piece in 2026, ‘gathering Inuit throat singers, musicians, and performers within a staged environment'. Following the release of sixth solo album, called 'Saputjiji', Tagaq makes an exclusive mixtape for Late Junction, a thirty-minute mix which delves into some of the sounds and music that are most meaningful to her. Produced by Cat Gough. A Reduced Listening production for BBC Radio 3. To listen on most smart speakers just say, “ask BBC Sounds to play Late Junction”.