By-Tor.com

TORONTO (CP) - The prog-rock experiments of the band Rush are among works that should be preserved for future generations, says a committee tasked with saving the best in Canadian television, radio, film and music.

The band's 1976 album "2112," a unique blend of classic rock and synthesizers that made Rush a sensation both in Canada and the United States, is one of 12 cultural pieces named Thursday as MasterWorks by the Audio-Visual Preservation Trust.

The public-sector group promotes the protection of classic Canadian works and selects a dozen every year for preservation, offering funds for those in danger of being lost.

Also chosen this year is what's considered Canada's first homegrown TV hit, "The Pig & Whistle."

"We are thrilled with the selections this year and commend the juries for uncovering these important gems from our past," Stephen Ellis, 2006 chair of MasterWorks, said Wednesday in a release.

"The safeguarding of these selections is so important to the foundation of Canadian culture. Without MasterWorks, future generations would be missing these extraordinary windows into the past," added trust president David Novek.

Poor preservation methods have already resulted in the loss of a wealth of Canadian material, including Canada's first silent film "Evangeline" (1913) and "The Crimson Paradise" (1933), the country's first talkie feature.

Gov. Gen. Michaelle Jean is expected to be among those attending a ceremony in Toronto on Oct. 26 honouring this year's selections.

Since 2000, expert juries in each category have annually chosen three works that were a critical or popular success, or influential in shaping its genre.

Also designated as MasterWorks this year are the recordings of soprano singer Pierrette Alarie and her husband, the late tenor Leopold Simoneau, who flourished from the early 1940s to 1970, and the body of work by avant-garde jazz musician Paul Bley.

In television, the committee singled out "The Champions," a 1978 documentary produced by CBC and National Film Board chronicling the careers of the late Quebec premier Rene Levesque and prime minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau; "Duplessis," a seven-part CBC miniseries depicting the life of Maurice Duplessis; and the "Pig & Whistle," a British-flavoured CTV show that ran for 10 years beginning in 1967.

In radio, the group will safeguard "Fideles aux postes," a four-episode documentary series covering the history of the golden age of French radio in Quebec; Frank Willis's reporting of the Moose River Mine Disaster in Nova Scotia in April 1936; and the body of work of broadcaster Harry (Red) Foster, who was responsible for the first full network radio broadcast of the 1934 Grey Cup in Toronto, the introduction of noon news broadcasts, and the first televised Grey Cup game for the CBC in 1952.

In film, they've chosen "Les Bons debarras," about a young girl and her obsessive love for her mother; "Isabel," a 1968 thriller about a young girl who returns to her childhood home to find the terrors that lurk within it; and "Wavelength," Michael Snow's groundbreaking film often hailed as, the "Citizen Kane" of experimental cinema.

On the web:

http://www.avtrust.ca/