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Print2010 November/December On The Wind (News)
Musical Notes
Here’s a look at some of the best CDs that have recently crossed our desk.
One of the most intriguing, Aztlan Underground, comes from the Los Angeles–based quartet Aztlan (www.aztlanunderground.net). This cry for the earth and life—with lyrics in English and an unidentified Indian language of Mexico—is not for the romantic, with its disturbing themes of pending apocalyptic judgment. Named after the legendary homelands of several major Mexican Indian peoples, this band reflects the conflicted Indio-Hispanic character of the American Southwest, with an underpinning of hardcore metal/thrash. A booklet of powerful graphics and paintings accompanies lyrics like this in “Be God”: “Destroy the dogma/Unleash the facade/Decolonize worship and free God/We are God.”
We really are digging The Acoustic Sessions (Vanguard Records) from Indigenous. Spanning a 10-year period, from 1998’s album Things We Do to 2008’s Broken Lands, the 11 tracks highlight Mato Nanji’s distinctive voice and excellent guitar work, with subtle accompaniment by Jamie Candiloro on percussion, bass and keyboards (he also produced and engineered); Leah Nanji on vocals; and Lisa Germano on violin. Notes Mato on the liner notes, “Every song I’ve ever written began with the acoustic guitar, so it only felt natural to create an acoustic album.” Some tasty treats here, along with arrangements that provide a new perception of and appreciation for this superstar of Indian musicians.
A fresh idealism infuses We Are, by the Canadian-based band Digging Roots (www.diggingrootsmusic.com). Note the album’s title track, in which they sing, “We are we are we are/So much more/Than all this war/And destruction,” or the lovely “Plant the Seed,” in which they sing “If we want to be seen as an equal/If we want to be free as a people/Then plant the seed/Plant the Seed.” A spare album, it is composed largely of vocals laid down to some catchy beats by mostly a cast of female musicians. The 13 credited musicians were produced by Kinnie Starr.
I’ll admit it: I’m an old fogey and don’t appreciate rap or hip-hop, especially the glorification of violence and degradation of women, but I left Lowlife from the Rez Hogs (www.rezhogs.com) spinning for its entirety. With only a minimum of trash talk, it’s more musical than most, and I found myself bumpin’ and thumpin’ in my desk chair. “Across Town,” one of the CD’s 18 tracks, with guest artist MC Supaman (of Crow Agency, Montana), has received airplay in quite a few states. The band took the Native American Music Award in 2009 for its previous disc, All Day All Night.
Gary Farmer may be best known and loved as an actor, including great roles in Powwow Highway, Smoke Signals and the compelling Dead Man, but he is also a credible blues musician, as heard in his latest CD, Make a Change (Gonzo Drive Records; for a copy send $15 to P.O. Box 31096, Santa Fe, NM 87594). There are only six tracks here, but each one is a gem, including some takes on classics like “Seventh Son” and “Born Under a Bad Sign,” as well as an original tune “Make a Change” and a song by the excellent Martha Redbone and partner Aaron Whitby, “Troublemaker.” Vocally, Farmer can growl with the best of ’em and plays a mean harp.
The world’s largest Indian powwow, the Gathering of Nations (www.gatheringofnations.com) held every April in Albuquerque, has released A Spirit’s Dance, a compilation of the best music from its 2010 event. Included here are an impressive 21 tracks from the likes of Midnite Express, Tha Tribe, Eyabay, Headstone, Rocky Boy, Wild Band of Comanches, Cozad and Eagle Mountain.
The Native culture of the Island of Hawaii, the so-called “Big Island,” is celebrated in song with a compilation of traditional and contemporary tunes, Na Mele Moku O Keawe drawn exclusively from its home turf. Mastered by two-time Grammy winner Daniel Ho (and available on his Web site at www.danielho.com), the CD features a stellar cast of 11 musicians with most songs sung in Hawaiian.
From the Yukon-born and raised Native musician Diyet comes a good freshman effort, The Breaking Point (www.diyetmusic.com). Though it’s inconsistent in quality, at times her beautiful voice, lyrics and tempo line up effectively on this 10-track release.
If you’re a fan of World Beat music and cross-cultural concoctions, the sixth CD, Tribal Vision, from the band Big City Indians (www.bigcityindians.com) is right up your alley. The music is quite good in a cinematic fashion, with soaring chants, smooth flutes and driving rock beats from this Vienna, Austria–based quintet.
East Coast Arts Shuffle
Native artists in the northeastern and southeastern U.S. are getting a rare chance to learn from each other and move out of their customary artistic realms through an innovative program coordinated by the New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA). During four days in July, four New England–based Native artists exchanged ideas and techniques in North Carolina with a group of four artists from the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Nation; and in September, the same artists met again to continue their process, with at least some traveling to New England to meet their contemporaries and visit sites with strong Native historical associations.
“There is a mindset to keep to our own traditions and regions,” notes artist and NEFA Native Arts Program Coordinator Dawn Spears (Narragansett). “We need to acknowledge and respect that, but at the same time provide an opportunity for visibility of Native artists,” and opportunities for artists from different regions to learn from each other. The artists involved in the exchange included ceramics artisans Darrin Bark (Cherokee) and Brenda Hill (Tuscarora), musicians Jennifer Kreisberg (Tuscarora) and Paula Nelson (Cherokee), storytellers Fredda Paul (Passamaquoddy) and Gerri Wolfe Grady (Cherokee), and weavers and bead artisans Elizabeth James Perry (Wampanoag) and Kimberly Bottchenbaugh (Cherokee).
“The artists found out they had a lot in common,” continues Spears. “The differences were largely based on the specifics of their home landscapes and tribal histories. But several noted that they were ready to carry on for many more days—had time allowed.”
NEFA, the nonprofit arts foundation based in Boston, says that if it’s judged successful, it hopes to expand the program in the future to Native artists throughout the nation. In other NEFA news, the group has received a two-year, $3.3 million grant from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and $275,000 from the MetLife Foundation for its National Dance Project. This includes funding of dancer Emily Johnson (Yup’ik descent). Details: www.nefa.org
Lines
A report has been released by the David Suzuki Foundation, the Canadian Boreal Initiative and the Boreal Songbird Initiative detailing the practical, daily uses of boreal forest trees, plants and flowers by Canada’s Native peoples; read it at www.borealcanada.ca/pr/02-01-2010-e.php. … In late August, famed artist Maya Lin (sculptor of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, D.C.) dedicated her newest site-based monumental artwork, “Story Circles,” at Sacajawea State Park in Pasco, Washington as part of the Confluence Project. The sculpture is a series of basalt stone rings with text and images of plants, fish and animals important to local Native cultures. … The Wilderness Society has presented its highest citizen’s honor to Billy Frank (Nisqually) of Olympia, Washington for his lifelong efforts to protect the salmon of the Pacific Northwest, which are also the subject of a book by Charles Wilkinson, Messages from Frank’s Landing. … In May, the University of Montana at Missoula opened the Payne Family Native American Center, which house the Native American Studies Department and American Indian Student Services for the university’s 700-some Indian students. … Indian activists in North Carolina recently succeeded in getting the name of U.S. 74 in Robeson County changed from the Andrew Jackson Highway to the American Indian Highway, in recognition of the central role President Jackson played in the tragic and criminal removal of tens of thousands of Indians from the southeastern U.S. to Oklahoma in the 1800s. … Canyon Records musician Radmilla Cody (Diné) has been selected by National Public Radio for inclusion in its series 50 Great Voices, featuring unique musical talents; listen at www.npr.org/templates/player/mediaPlayer.html?action=1&t=1&islist=false&id=126638085&m=126661740. … The Viejas Band of Kumeyaay Indians has opened the first official California Welcome Center to be located on tribal land, just off Interstate 8 at the Viejas Outlet Center in Alpine, 30 miles east of San Diego. … The federal government is investing more than $32 million to bring high-speed Internet connectivity to thousands of homes and businesses scattered across the vast Navajo Nation; some 550 miles of new fiber-optic cable and 59 new or improved microwave towers will be installed as part of the communications system. … Acoma Pueblo of New Mexico has completed a 4,500-seat outdoor amphitheater next to its Sky City Casino and Hotel, located on I-40 about 45 minutes west of Albuquerque, which includes a 40-by-60-foot stage, a picnic area, and a welcome center housed in a renovated historic ranch house powered by a photovoltaic solar system. … The Umatilla Tribes of Oregon have opened a new $23 million Governance Center in Pendleton. … One of the few Pueblo kivas open to the general public has been restored in a three-year effort at Coronado State Monument in Bernalillo, New Mexico.
Shards
Peter Espiritu debuted a new Hawaiian dance opera in October, Poli’ahu. The opera, performed by his Tau Dance Theater, tells a story of the goddess of the volcanic peak Mauna Kea on her migration home with her sisters. It is the third Hawaiian-themed opera from the Honolulu-based artist, whose dance works combine traditional Hawaiian choreography with modern dance and ballet as well as ancient musical forms such as mele and oli. Details: www.taudance.org
For several decades, the not-for-profit Native American Co-op of Tucson, Arizona has produced a compendium of hard-to-find information regarding Indian institutions in the United States and Canada called the Native American Directory. It is now preparing to release an updated version, and is offering the 878-page, 1996 library edition of the book, originally valued at $131, for $10.70. The directory includes listings of Indian galleries, museums, cultural centers, trading posts, media, events, organizations, dance groups, Bureau of Indian Affairs offices, Indian Health Service clinics and a wealth of other information, as well as sections on tracing one’s Indian ancestry, a buyer’s guide to Indian arts, and other helpful information. Send a self-addressed mailing label and check or money order to Fred Synder, P.O. Box 27626, Tucson, AZ 85726. (No out-of-country shipping.)
Director James Cameron and actress Sigourney Weaver of Avatar fame traveled to the Xingu River of Brazil in April to see firsthand the Native communities that might be displaced by waters of a major dam now under construction on the Xingu. The Belo Monte dam’s construction and the resulting reservoir will displace some 20,000 people and flood 668 square kilometers of forest. Weaver noted the $17 billion dam, if finished, will be “a disaster for the river, the rainforest and the Indigenous people living along the river. Their way of life will disappear,” paralleling the fictional story of Avatar and the planet Pandora. Details: www.messagefrompandora.org or www.amazonwatch.org
The contemporary dance company Dancing Earth, led by choreographer and dancer Rulan Tangen (Métis), is on a national tour of their production Of Bodies of Elements, supported by a grant from the National Dance Project. The full-length work is inspired by concepts of Indigenous ecology and includes an all-Native creative team, from dancers to designers of costumes, props, sets, hair and make-up. Performances are set for Nov. 3–5 in Phoenix, Dec. 1–4 in San Diego, Jan. 19–21 in Helena, Montana, and April 21–23 in Riverside, California. Details: www.dancingearth.org
The Navajo Code Talkers Foundation has initiated a fundraising campaign to build a Code Talkers museum and veterans center on a site about 17 miles northwest of Gallup, New Mexico. The facility is expected to cost about $42 million and open in 2013. Donations can be sent to the foundation at P.O. Box 1266, Window Rock, AZ 86515. Details: www.navajocodetalkers.org
Musician, music producer, actor, motivational speaker and activist Litefoot (Cherokee) is rolling out an ambitious new line of products and projects. In October, in conjunction with the company Sole Nation Health, he launched a line of footwear, the Litefoot sneaker. It will be distributed to tribal health programs and sold through retail outlets and the entrepreneur’s Web site. He is also expanding his apparel line—Native Style Clothing—through casino-specific products, and will release his newest CD, The Testament, on Nov. 11 on his label Red Vinyl. It will include 11 new tracks and 20 remastered songs. On Dec. 11, he will unveil an 11-album box set titled The Lite Years. He has also self-published a book, The Medicine of Prayer, chronicling his personal journey over the past 20 years. By all measures, Litefoot’s popularity and reach continue to grow. His single “My Chick” has received more than 300,000 views on YouTube. Details: www.litefoot.com
Passages
Sonny Tuttle (Lakota) was killed in a motor vehicle accident on July 25. Founder of his family-based endeavor Red Nations Art, he was active on the powwow circuit and was well known for his traditional hide paintings and creation of drums, dance regalia and other traditional arts and crafts. Born in 1931, he served in the Korean War and worked with the United Nations and for the Bureau of Indian Affairs, among many roles, during his productive life.
Honoring
The dance/live music production Tono, choreographed and directed by Sandra Laronde (Ojibwe) and performed by her company Red Sky Performance, has won an important Canadian honor: the Dora Mavor Moore Award, presented by the Toronto Alliance for the Performing Arts for excellence in performance. It is but one of many significant recent achievements for this company, which include performances at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, and World Expo 2010 in Shanghai, China. The music of Tono is now available on CD. Details: www.redskyperformance.com
Kateri Walker (Chippewa), star of the notable film Kissed By Lightning (see Sept./Oct. 2010 issue), has been in the spotlight lately. She was recently nominated for the ACTRA (Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists) Peer Award for Outstanding Female Actor in the film. She also attended the June White House reception for Sir Paul McCartney when he received the Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song from President Obama; while there she had the chance to hang with Stevie Wonder, Herbie Hancock, Faith Hill and Jerry Seinfeld. Walker also has become a Nike N7 Ambassador, and will soon appear in an ad campaign for the apparel company Native Threads.
The films Ivan and Ivan and Shimasani came away with major prizes at the First Peoples Festival, held in June in Montréal. The former, directed by Russian filmmaker Phillip Abryutin, took the Best Short Film award; the latter, directed by Blackhorse Lowe (Navajo) and shot by Smokey Nelson, was presented the award for Best Cinematography. Ivan and Ivan documents the subsistence lifestyle in the Magadan region of Russia; and Shimasani, in black and white, evocatively portrays a young woman’s life on the Navajo reservation circa 1930 as she faces a major choice. Other films garnering awards at the 20th-anniversary event included Welcome by Daniel Gerson, Rehje by Anais Huerta and Raúl Cuesta, and Les Vrais Gagnants by Jean Fontaine. Details: www.nativelynx.qc.ca
Artist Dave McGary has been selected to design and build a monumental bronze sculpture in Corpus Christi, Texas, honoring the region’s Native peoples. The work, a composite of various sculptures he’s done in the past, will be titled “Ishka” (Apache for “Until I See Again”) and will feature an Indian holy man on horseback facing east. It will overlook the second-largest Indian burial ground in the state, which has been plundered over the years. “People don’t realize the rich Indian history of Texas or the fact there are lots of Indians still living here,” notes project director Larry Running Turtle Salazar (Apache/Cherokee). “The only thing to commemorate our people here are street names.” Funds are being raised for the $300,000 project. Donations may be sent to the American Indian Monument Project, c/o the Center for Progressive Study & Culture, P.O. Box 537, Corpus Christi, TX 78403. Details: www.staip.webs.com
Five artists have been selected for prestigious, and lucrative, Eiteljorg Fellowships, presented biannually by the Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art in Indianapolis. They are Bonnie Devine (Ojibwe) of Toronto, Skawennati Fragnito (Mohawk) of Montréal, Duane Slick (Meskwaki) of Rhode Island, Anna Tsouhlarakis (Navajo/Creek) of Washington, D.C., and Alan Michelson (Mohawk) of New York City. Details: www.fellowship.eiteljorg.org
The Santa Fe Indian Market awarded a record amount of prize money at the 2010 event, including prizes in a new category: filmmaking. Sharing the Best of Show prize, in fact, was the film Shimasani, directed by Blackhorse Lowe (Navajo), and a stunning katsina by Stetson Honyumptewa (Hopi). Other top winners included Daniel Sunshine Reeves (Navajo) in jewelry, Robert Patricio (Acoma Pueblo) in pottery, Eve-Lauryn LaFountain (Chippewa) in visual arts, Jason Quigno (Chippewa) in sculpture, Patricia Michaels (Taos Pueblo) in textiles, Charlene Holy Bear (Sioux) in diverse art forms, Vanessa Jennings (Pima/Kiowa) in beading and quill work, Dolores Garza (Haida) in basketry, and Trent Lee (Navajo) in the youth classification.
Victorialyn McCarthy (Navajo) is a young designer on the go. In October, she showed her outstanding apparel at Phoenix Fashion Week, and last year she was part of Scottsdale Fashion Week. She also runs her own business, VickiLyn’s Closet.
Tony Reyna (Taos Pueblo) has been presented the seventh annual Spirit of the Heard Award, presented annually by the Heard Museum in Phoenix for outstanding public service and accomplishments.
Sculptor and visual artist Doug Coffin (Potawatomi/Creek) recently visited Abu Dhabi, where he showed a group of work sponsored by the Art in Embassies program.
George Tahdooahnippah (Comanche) is a rising star in the field of boxing, with a record of 24-0-1. But he’s much more. Last May he obtained a degree in management from Cameron University through a wrestling scholarship, and he is the fitness director for the tribe’s diabetes program at the Comanche Nation Fitness Center in Lawton, Oklahoma. He and his wife, Mia, just added their first daughter to their family of three sons. Details: www.comancheboy.com
