Richard Bégin - Lavrador (2024)

"Lavrador" is a Portuguese term signifying peasant, plowman, or cultivator. Additionally, it is the name of the explorer João Fernandes Lavrador, associated with Labrador, a continental region in eastern Canada. Despite having a population of fewer than 30,000 inhabitants over an expansive area of nearly 300,000 square kilometers, this polar and subarctic expanse in the North Atlantic captivates with its dreamlike landscapes, vastness, tranquility, and solitude. Inspired by this immense terrain and the lives of the solitary peasants and isolated communities within it, each track on this album seeks to convey the essence of an ecology simultaneously fragile, merciless, and sublime. The title track incorporates samples from Kathryn O'Hara's radio documentary for CBC, titled "The Land God Gave to Cain, A Documentary Journey Down the Coast of Labrador" (1983).
The album Lavrador aims to evoke a broader sense of being lost — lost in one's own home, in solitude, amidst work and isolation. It acknowledges that every region on the planet has its own Lavrador, a place of profound personal significance and introspection.