OTTAWA, Dec. 21 - For three consecutive nights last week, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation presented a nationalistic, even, arguably, chauvinistic television series celebrating Canada's contribution to pop and rock music over the last three decades.

Entitled "Heart of Gold" after a song by the Winnipeg-born musician Neil Young, the three hour-long segments sought to make the point that there was something special, something distinctly Canadian, about Canadian pop artists. The series consistently reflected Canada's preoccupation with the evolution and maintenance of a cultural identity that is somehow distinct from that of the United States with its huge market and overpowering allure.

But like most attempts to affirm specifically Canadian sensibilities, the show at times touched on the basic, much-discussed predicament of artists and performers here, which is just how can they express or protect their alleged Canadian-ness in the face of the cultural winds from across the border.

As Donald Sutherland, the Canadian actor best known in his own country for his roles in American movies, narrated the retrospective, one singer after another told of heading south. From the doo-wah groups like the Diamonds and the Crewcuts who, in the 1950's, cut such hit records as "Why Do Fools Fall in Love" and "Sh-boorn" in New York, to Paul Anka, who has a street named after him in his native Ottawa, to Joni Mitchell and Robbie Robertson, the entertainers appeared on the show like home town boys and girls who made good. But the home town in this case was Canada, a nation of 24 million.

The creators of the show, who strung together old tapes and current interviews with more than 20 performers, said they wanted to billboard the Canadian-ness of these musicians, if not necessarily their music.

"We felt that popular music was one of Canada's richest resources and it was something that people in all parts of our diverse country could relate to" said John Brunton, the show's producer." As we were making the show, the reaction we got was 'My God, I didn't realize that all those people were Canadian!' In a sense our show was an investigation of who we are."

But if the main rationale of the program could be summarized as "Look, all these people are Canadian," a constant refrain was also, "Look, some were even good enough to be successful in the United States." Yearnings for a government-sheltered "national" art, and contradictory desires to participate in a North American cultural market succinctly echo the constant debate here on national cultural priorities.

These were again amplified last month by the release of a Government-financed, three-year study calling for more federal funds to generate a Canadian cultural boom that might stave off what is perceived as the cultural blitzkrieg from the United States.

The recognition that Canada was professionally confining was repeated by many of the performers on the program. For example, David Clayton-Thomas, one of the founders of the California-spawned Buffalo Springfield, declared on the show, "If I stayed in Canada, I could have done very well, but nobody would have noticed."

Others, such as the folk singers Ian & Sylvia, and John Kaye, who sings with Steppenwolf, another group of California-influenced Canadians, talked of their Toronto years as preludes to their American tours and appearances..

On the other hand, the singer Anne Murray talked of successfully resisting the pressure to live in the States and her need to remain in Canada. Though she said she felt forced by her success to move from Nova Scotia to Toronto, Miss Murray made it clear that she felt secure here while finding American show business threatening.

Murray McLaughlan, a balladeer who is best known here in his own country, rejected outright the conventional accounts of the Canadian performers' problem. "There ain't no problem except that it's a big country and the cities are far apart and you can’t make as much money as you can in the States. The only ones who see it as a problem are the television interviewers and the newspaper editors," said Mr. McLaughlan on the show.

Is There ‘Canadian Music’?

One thing the series clearly established was that this country, with a population base roughly equal to California’s, has produced a great many prominent musicians, though whether they perform "Canadian music," any more than did the late Glenn Gould or the jazz pianist Oscar Peterson, is debatable.

Stanley Colbert, the director of light entertainment for the CBC and a relatively recent immigrant to Canada from Hollywood, said he found "a much more intimate relationship with nature" in the music. "The Canadian writes and sings about love in the perspective of an environmentalist," he said in an interview. Mr. Colbert’s views were supported by such songs as Gordon Lightfoot’s "Canadian Railroad Trilogy," which is as much the Canadian folk anthem as "This Land is Your Land" is the American. Anne Murray’s "Snowbird," and "American Woman," sung by The Guess Who, were distinctively Canadian in their imagery.

But it would be harder to make the case for most of the songs on the series, including "California Dreamin’" by the old half-Canadian quartet, The Mamas and Papas, or for "My Way," the Frank Sinatra standard written by Mr. Anka.

The issue and definition of "Canadian content" is another key element of the continuing cultural debate. Under federal regulations, at least 30 percent of all musical programming for radio must have Canadian content, which means that it must be written or performed by Canadians. Television programming must have 60 percent Canadian content.

The consequences of these policies seemed varied. For one thing, Canadian modern classical composers and musicians get much more air time than do their American counterparts. Secondly, a home-grown pop industry has developed, promoted in large measure by the need to fulfill Canadian content requirements. On the other hand, there are someone who argue that the entire Canadian pop industry serves as something of a minor league to groom and prepare talent for the American culture market.

While the television series found itself entangled in the American-Canadian cultural snarl, it made no reference at all to the French popular music of Quebec, which has flourished to accompany the aroused nationalism of French-speaking Canadians. Mr. Brunton, the producer of "Heart of Gold," said he felt the Quebec music was so distinct and rich that it deserved its own program and that he was hoping to do another series on Canadian musicians, but one that would concern those who perform in French.