SHORT BIOGRAPHY
'Tiger' Will Mason is a multi-faceted actor, musician, activist, and award-winning singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. He is Mohawk, with some Upper Cayuga and Tuscarora heritage. He was given the name of 'Kahn-tah-wi-wim-tchi-get', meaning 'Maker of Beautiful Music' by an Ojibway/Anishinabe Elder. For more than 45 years, Will has performed around the continent, in bands, as a solo artist, as a band leader, and as a session musician on other artists' CDs. He has recorded an award-winning CD of original music which received airplay on the radio. He has won accolades for both his voice and his outstanding skill playing multiple instruments. In 1994 he won in the "Adult Performer" category on the show "Home Grown Cafe", In 1993 he entered a karaoke contest humorlessly an won first prize. In 2008 in Albuquerque New Mexico, he was nominated for 5 awards at the first annual Native-E Music Awards. He won “Mainstream Song Of The Year”. In 2012 he won first prize for "Canada's Aboriginals Got Talent" competition. He has assisted in writing plays and songs with other artists. He has toured as an actor, has performed both on film and television since the 1980s.
LONG BIOGRAPHY
“Tiger” Will Mason has been on stage for over half of his life. He started teaching himself drums at 7; songs on the piano in his teens, and could play rhythm guitar, and various songs by the age of 20. He acted in plays, performed for his high school, to standing ovations, by the time he left home in 1983. He then moved from rural Niagara Peninsula to Toronto to pursue a career in the arts.
Playing coffee houses, and created bands for various functions, in 1986 he met several street musicians in the downtown core of Toronto, and they began playing and writing songs. By this time Will had acted in theater, television, toured Canada as an actor, and gained some respect within the Indigenous performing arts community. He participated in K.Y.T.E.S., a theater troupe that toured Canada in 1985, and had a TV documentary made about it. The documentary featured songs by Will and his sister CJ Mason, a bluegrass songwriter. He was also a production assistant with K.Y T.E.S. In 1987 he met like minded musicians busking on Yonge Street. They formed ‘4 Way Street’, Canada’s only complete ‘tribute’ band to the music of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. Moving to Ottawa in the summer of that same year, they were booked for shows and tours by various agencies, including The Agency, playing big venues around Ontario, and opening for many major recording acts. 4 Way Street where together until 1995. During this time, apart from the core members, of which Tiger was a member, they played with various other members. In 2005 they reunited and played for special events and for private functions. During that time, “Tiger” Will competed in contests under his former name of Andy Mason. In 1994 he won Male Adult Performer of the Year, performing some of his new songs on a television program called Homegrown Café broadcast from CJOH-TV in Ottawa. The show had an estimated 200,000-1 million viewers on any given Sunday night, and won under his former name Andy, which led him to’s “”, where
In 1998, he moved to British Columbia, and joined with an old friend and began performing around the Lower Mainland. This led to a CD recording of songs he had begun writing as far back as 1984. The CD, called ‘Long Walk 49’, was first released in 2001 in BC, and then again in 2008 in the U.S. The CD was picked up by Aboriginal Voices Radio across Canada, and enjoyed quite a bit of airplay for several years. In 2008, he entered the Native-E Music Awards in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and was nominated for 5 awards. He won the ‘Mainstream Song of the Year’ award for his song ‘Battle Raging’ which he performed live on the show.
While still in British Columbia he continued playing various venues, Indigenous festivals, and opening for and playing with several artists like Joanne Shenandoah and Keith Secola. Along with his band they opened for the legendary Redbone, and jammed with the late Floyd ‘Red Crow’ Westerman, of “Dances With Wolves” fame. He played several instruments on musician Joey Onley’s debut CD, ‘Radical Folk of the Great North’, which was produced by Joey, with help from Will, and David Roy Parsons. Will and David had a small production venture to produce their own, and Joey’s music. He also played with several other artists, contributing to their studio work, for which he was never credited. It was not that important to him; it was a forum for him to improve his playing and experience. He also acted as an extra in television and film. Some of the TV series and movies he worked on were The X-Files’; ‘Battlestar Galactica’; ‘Masters of Horror’; film ‘Out Cold’, and others. In 2014 he
had a bit part as an indigenous elder in the CBC Miniseries’ “The Best Laid Plans”.
He moved back to Eastern Ontario in 2009. He continues to write, perform, and act. He has played a few big Indigenous festivals in Ottawa, winning ‘Canada’s Aboriginals got Talent’ in 2012. This gained him an opening slot for fellow Six Nations player and Juno winner Murray Porter in 2013. In 2014, he played the Kingsville Folk Music Festival, with Jane Siberry, Bruce Cockburn, Valdy, Jaron Freeman-Fox, Fish and Bird, Ken Whiteley, and many others. He did a series of solo shows in B.C. in the fall of 2015, gaining more recognition for his music and style, which encompasses many genres.
He continues to play, hosting jams and sessions for others, and also playing in cover bands as well as solo shows around Ottawa and Southern Ontario. He is still writing, and will have his sophomore CD out in the near future.