An Indigenous community in southwestern Ontario is mourning the loss of music legend Robbie Robertson, who died this week at 80.

Robertson’s mother was raised on Six Nations of the Grand River, and his family has asked that donations be made to support the community’s new Woodland Cultural Centre.

“You reach a certain point in your life and you start to look at your own identity and be proud of it, and he’s got that DNA, those traits where you know we’ve been stereotyped and discriminated  against and we’re a proud people with rich history and culture and he knows that and I think he wanted to promote it,” says Ava Hill who co-chairs of the capital committee for the project.

The Toronto-born Robertson spent summers at Six Nations, where he would watch relatives play guitar and sing.