Lecture 3 - Musics of North America, Indigeneity and Spirituality

indigeneity

relational and fluid concept, common thread is that there is colonialism that happens and indigenous people are affected by this, concerns itself with settler colonialism

united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (DRIP)

one of the first instruments where the beneficiaries were involved in the negotiation process, describes the shared circumstances of indigenous peoples as follows: both self identity as indigenous and are accepted by an indigenous community as their member, sustain historical continuities with pre colonial societies, privilege relationships to particular lands, waters and natural resources, practice distinct social, economic or political systems, maintain distinct language, culture and beliefs, form non dominant groups of society, protect and advance ancestral ways knowing and being as distinctive peoples and communities

relationality/relatedness

an ideal which demonstrates a deeply rooted or radical, not isolated, relationships between all human and more than human entities, must be reached before much can be understood about native songs, music , instruments and worldview, mcnally describes an orientation among the ojibwe/anishinaabe people toward the social, natural and spiritual world that presumes relationality, that prioritizes the subject’s place in a web of relations and vigilantly reminds the subject ever to place her/himself in terms of that web of relations

relationship with intimates

connections cultivated with known persons, lineages, community members, spirit beings and so on, inuit throat singing or inuit vocal games

relationships beyond the community

acknowledging old connections (trade and connection long before European contact), initiating new ones, powwows

inuit

an indigenous people who live primarily in inuit nunangat, the inuit homeland, inuit nunangat includes the inuvialuit settlement region (northwest territories), nunavut, nunavik (northern quebect) and nunatsiavut (northern labrador)

inuit throat singing or vocal games

this is predominantly a women’s genre, the texts and sounds if which in addition to serving as entertainment for the women and children left behind while the men went out on the ice to hunt game, also served as enigmatic riddles which the listeners who are typically children must decipher

enigmatic riddles

they are relational and radical sonic practices meant to develop the imagination and reasoning powers of a child or an adult, they are not only ambiguities in the text once it is understood but it is a challenge to one’s ears and intellect to comprehend the sounds in the first place

oral cultural

must be learnt from someone and cannot be written down, great gift to have and to share, performers often sing these in pairs, two performers stand face to face, in some cases holding one another’s arms while moving together in time, also performed solo, when performed by two singers, vocal textures sound very dense because the participants perform the same or very similar patterns just a beat apart, games make an immense array of vocal sounds and vocables, some created while inhaling and others created while exhaling, some voice and others unvoiced, sing in interlocking patterns directly into one another’s face being an example of how music connects people to one another in immediate ways, articulates broader network of relations in northern indigenous communities, some songs incorporate imitations of natural sounds like honking of geese connecting through sound the human and other than human inhabitants of land

when do vocal games traditionally finish?

they end when one of the participants runs out of breath or laughs, you can hear participant’s laughter in some recordings, performers are valued for their endurance and quality of the vocal sound they produce

doctrine of discovery

legitimized colonization of land outside of Europe, if you found it you have the right to claim the land

constitution act

colonial responsibility of indigenous people was passed to the federal government

inuit rebellion

moved inuit people from quebec to the islands forcibly

tanya tagaq

one of the most well known inuit throat singers, improvisational singer, avant garde composer and bestselling author, world changing figure at the forefront of seismic social, political and environmental change

powwows

native north american gatherings where participants perform in a number of specific dance styles, accompanied by drum song, intertribal practice through and though, open to all, even non indigenous people, the larger powwow circuit, northern and southern powwow styles, for most native people, even those who live in urban areas, tribal identity comes first, then indian identity and national identity third

northern style powwow

the singing style is chant like with a distinctive cascading or terraced melodic contour, which starts high at the top of the vocal range and remains primarily on one pitch before falling or gradually descending to successively lower pitch levels, given that a prominent role is played by percussion instruments, it has a strong sense of pulse and forward motion, music is metrically irregular, the beat is not grouped into regularly occurring groups of two, three, four, etc,

monophonic

having a single melodic line (no harmonies) even when more than person is singing

vocal timbre

varies among performers, but a strained sound is often desirable in the plains singing style

vocal pulsation

singers employ this in which a periodic slight increase in volume is used to create rhythmic accents, is common, especially when vocables are sung, songs consist of entirely of vocables or a mixture of vocables and word

push ups

refers to the fact that songs are usually repeated four times through, probably in recognition of the vocal effects required at the opening

leader

begins a vocal phrase and is followed shortly thereafter by the other voices, who either enter at the end of the leader’s initial call or overlap the lead voice to complete the phrase, group singing is most prominent during vocable sections while the leader may either sing the translatable sections as solos or with the group, all songs have the same structure a form that can be thought of as ABB

ABB form

the A section is referred to as lead and contains the material in the highest part of the singer’s range, this can be divided into two sub sections with similar melodies, sung by a soloist for the first time and second time by a group, the rest of the song BB is heard twice, these are much longer than the lead and can be divided into sub sections

dancers

expected to come to a halt on the last beat of the last push up of the song, even when dancing to a song that they have never heard before

northern style powwow drums

a large double sided or single sided frame drum is the most common instrument found in norther pow wow performances, the drum is normally placed on a stand with one face upward, the drummers sit around the drum and strike the face with padded mallets, the beat is steady, often with an unequal (short-long) rhythm that imitates the sound of a heartbeat, symbolic of mother earth, they are often referred to as the heartbeat of the indian nation

REPRESENT - DJ

the DJ is trying to imitate a geese call, he mimics turntable ism and indigenous dancing making us question if the DJ is actually a DJ, features the frame drum that creates a very steady beat, the voices are very strained

collaborative, cross community, transnational inuit music project

dismantles easy binaires of what it means to be alaska natives, the background track is eskimo flow, the descendants is the name of the artists featuring twin brothers DJ HeTook and DJ Riverflowz, Evie Mark and Taqralik Patridge, inuit vocalists, it shows how tribal alliances not only transcend the boundaries of individual indian nations so not only is the performance intertribal but they are also forming relations with american musical life, through hip hop and flash mobs more broadly

the sound of inuit transnationalism in Represent - DJ He took

samples of actual inuit performances, so inuit drumming and throat singing are included, there are arctic soundscapes like the sounds of walking on the snow, remixing the track using modern technologies, citing global hip hop aesthetics, mixes familiar aural and visual tropes of place (rural/urban), time (ancient/modern), genre (native/non native), tech (manual/mechanized) and belonging (tribal or national / intertribal or transnational) it also mixes content (stories and forms) affiliations (inter and intra village), regalia (traditional and modern clothing), participation (men and women, youth and mid life) and function (sacred and secular)

harmful tropes

indigenous peoples as windows to the past, rather than communities striving in the preset, sounds as integral to indigenous self discrimination and resurgence movements in the contemporary world, perea forwards relational and radical ways of listening to a vast architecture of inuit presence across a range of genres from hip hop to christianity hymnody and drumsongs to funk and R&B to register how a density (not difference) of indigenous ways of musicking invites readers to listen more critical to and for intersections of music, indigeneity and colonialism in the americas

soul

the spiritual part of a person believed to give life to the body and in many religions thought to live forever, the non physical aspect of a human being, considered responsible for the functions of mind and individual personality and often thought to survive death

spirit

an animating or vital principle held to give life to physical organisms, a supernatural being or essence, how does music intersect with soul and the spirit

spirituality

a quality that involves deep feelings and beliefs of a religious nature, rather than the physical parts of life, a concern for or sensitivity to things of spirit or soul, especially as opposed to materialistic concerns

prehistoric and indigenous traditions

drums, rattles, and flutes among the oldest ritual instruments, use rhythmic drumming and chanting

ancient civilizations

mesopotamia and egypt hymns and chants were integral to temple worship, for india the vadas and the concept of nada brahma which is the idea that the world is sound, for greece pythagoras and music universalis

religious chanting and liturgy

in judaism psalms and torah readings were traditionally chanted, christianity partook in the gregorian chant originating in early medieval europe, in islam they have the qur’anic recitation and in buddhism they chant sutras and mantras

mysticism and devotional music

sufism is the islamic mysticism and dhikr is the repetition of divine naes, bhakti traditions in india involve devotional songs (bhajans and kirtans, jewish mysticism being the kabbalah is melodic chanting and repetitive intonation of divine names

resurgence (60s-70s)

the countercultural movements and rise of interest in alternative spiritual practices

resurgence movements

civil rights, anti war protests, rise of second wave feminism and environmentalism

emphasis

cultural critique with spiritual exploration that led to centrality of the interconnectedness of mind, body and spirit

80s and 90s resurgence

rising interest in world music, multiculturalism and holistic health practices (music festivals, retreats and community events across north america)

21st century resurgence

further expansion through the advent of social media and online platforms

tibetan singing bowls

used in meditation, energy healing and relaxation therapy

gong baths

deep sound immersion for stress relief and altered states of consciousness

research on sonic spiritual/wellness practices

may positively affect mood, stress, anxiety, physiological relaxation and subjective well being

limitations of current research on sonic spiritual/wellness practices

small samples and weak controls, short term focus, self report bias, inconsistent methods, unclear mechanisms/theories and overstated claims

cultural appropriation

the adoption of certain language, behavior, clothing or tradition belonging to a minority culture or social group by a dominant culture or group in a way that is exploitative, disrespectful or stereotypical, an imbalance of power between the appropriator and the appropriated is a critical condition of the concept

sonic appropriation

the taking up or borrowing of sounds, musical practices, chants or vocal/aural elements from one culture by another, especially when done without sufficient respect for knowledge of or acknowledgement of their original cultural, spiritual, linguistic or ritual context

chanting and mantra

used in yoga, spiritual gatherings and personal practice for healing

indigenous drumming

use drumming to induce trance states and healing

considerations

disconnections from original context/meaning, asymmetrical power relations, commodification of the sacred, consent and representation, exclusion and erasure