Songs and Questions of Intercultural Influence in Wabanaki Ceremonial Life

ANN MORRISON SPINNEY Franklin & Marshall College

INTRODUCTION Several genres of and dance songs recorded over the past century raise questions of cultural influence among Wabanaki communi­ ties, and between them and Iroquoian and western Algonquian peoples. Questions of cultural drift and population movement have been addressed at length by an array of scholars including Frank G. Speck, Fannie Hardy Eckstorm, Frank T. Siebert, Jr., Alvin H. Morrison, Harald E. L. Prins and Bruce J. Bourque; this paper seeks to add an additional perspective by looking at elements of ceremonial life. The paper focusses on the genre of Snake Dance songs, finding evidence that they are connected to ceremonies involved in alliances between First Nations of the Northeast.1 The questions that concern me here are those of song origin, transmis­ sion, and development among the Wabanaki communities. The genre I shall focus on, Snake Dance songs, is one for which documentation covers about a century and represents all of the five nations — Abenaki, Penob­ scot, Passamaquoddy, Maliseet and Micmac. Taken altogether, the sources, which include written descriptions by outside observers, record­ ings, and orally-transmitted information, present a complex and often contradictory history. It must be admitted that the available sources are partial, and we cannot even guess what evidence we may be missing. With this caveat, I present here some preliminary findings. The discussion centers on Passamaquoddy Snake Dances and their songs, which I have recently experienced at the Sipayik Ceremonial Days and other social

1 This paper is in part an homage to the late Frank Siebert, who directed a great deal of his attention to sorting out Penobscot linguistic developments. He was often vexed by questions similar to those I am tackling, as in his work on Proto-Algon­ quian words and their cultural significance. Siebert was prevented by illness from reviewing my work on songs, but despite being reduced to telephone contact his linguistic work was an inspiration and a guide, since language and song are inter­ related phenomena. His linguistic data on snakes was crucial in this investigation DANCE SONGS AND INTERCULTURAL INFLUENCE 335 events. Snake Dance songs were among the Fewkes recordings made in 1890, and have been a topic of great interest recently in Peskahtomuhkat- iyik. David A. Francis and Joseph A. Nicholas of the Waponahki Museum at Sipayik contributed a wealth of insight and information to this study; I am grateful for their help. The Snake Dance and its songs are part of the tradition of Wabanaki songs, and it will be necessary throughout this discussion to refer to other genres of social and ceremonial songs. My thesis is that the primarily social Snake Dance songs have close connections to ceremonial song genres associated with the Wampum ceremonies and political alliances in the Northeast. In advancing this argument, which will rely principally on musical evidence, I find that I am seconding some of the points made by Trudy Sable in her contextual study of the Micmac Serpent Dance (Sable 1998).

OVERVIEW OF PASSAMAQUODDY SONGS There are many genres of Passamaquoddy songs, all artistically designed to suit their function. However, some melodies are used for several different occasions, such as dancing and greeting; and extempo­ rized texts are often put to the pre-existing melodies to make the song specific to the event. In the contemporary Passamaquoddy tradition, there exist some "general purpose" melodies for dancing. These are often made up of short phrases, or motives, which are repeated to make verses and refrains. Extemporizing texts for these songs is a crucial part of the singer's artistry. The dance songs share many structural features with other Wabanaki songs. They are typically made up of musical phrases, arranged in verses; the verses are repeated as needed to accompany the action (dancing). Singers today tend to string several songs together if the dance goes on for awhile. What gives any song its particular identity and allows singers to judge the integrity of a performance is the melody. Singers can and do change the pitch level (i.e., transpose) the melody between verses of a song as long as they keep the tune intact. The European concepts of "key" and "scale" appear meaningless when applied to the Passamaquoddy repertories. There is no scale typical of Passamaquoddy songs. Some use a collection of pitches that is pentatonic, 336 ANN MORRISON SPINNEY others use six pitches, others use seven. Some use both major and minor thirds in the same verse. According to elder Joseph A. Nicholas, the "core" of the Passama­ quoddy song tradition are those associated with ceremonies. The public ceremonies of Passamaquoddy life today are mostly intertribal, which is consistent with the historical record. Elections, gatherings and marriages are still celebrated with dances as mentioned in the Wampum records of the Wabanaki confederacy, firstrecorde d in writing by Louis Nicholas in the late nineteenth century. The yearly public re-enactment of Wampum ceremony dances that takes place at Sipayik every August includes the Welcome Dance, Sakoms' Greeting Dance, Election Dance, War Club Dance, Peace Pipe ceremony and Marriage Dance. A Snake Dance is used to close the program.

CONTEMPORARY DESCRIPTION OF THE SNAKE DANCE The Snake Dance performed today is a . Participants join hands in a single line and, stepping to the beat of singing and/or drumming, they follow a leader who moves across or around the dancing space in a zigzag. The dance features a coiling and uncoiling of the line of dancers; sometimes this is the culmination of the dance. Sometimes the zigzagging is rough, making the dance into a game designed to throw dancers out of the line. Nicholas Smith (1955:34) described this as being like the children's game "Crack the Whip". This dance is unquestionably a ; it's a lot of fun. It is used at intertribal gatherings, and at the Sipayik Indian Day the public are encouraged to participate. On this occasion it is not rough, and I have seen it involve more than a hundred people of all ages. Currently, the songs sung for this Passamaquoddy Snake Dance are ad hoc. Singer Blanche Sockabason typically strings several dance song melodies together and extemporizes words (in the Passamaquoddy language) directing the dancers (see Transcription 1). Drum groups singing in the intertribal style have even used two-step songs, although some participants considered this unsuitable because their iambic triple meter does not match the rhythm of the Snake Dance step, a shuffle dance. (The two-step is a popular powwow dance for couples.) The Snake Dance as done at Sipayik today is similar to performances described by Nicholas Smith in the 1950s and 1960s. However, Smith was DANCE SONGS AND INTERCULTURAL INFLUENCE 337

Drum

E - Ii -ya - ha e - Ii -ya - qa-nu- le, E- li-va - ha e - Ii - va -

qa-nu - le. e -li-va ha - a. e - Ii - va qa-nu-te

>>>=-> >>>> > > 5- > > "V . N . • " ; -0—0- CV ICa -ka\*ehk- mu - sic at -hus^os- ya - qilu,

in n HD rrn rrn m: i ! I I i I i ! 1 > > >- > > >- > ;> > :>:>:>>- :>>-:>:> . 1. A :jF^ S^E 7 kiw tahqe-ssu - ssic. qey haywa- ni-hu qcy haywa- ni- hu (etc.)

Transcription 1. Passamaquoddy Snake Dance song, sung by Blanche Sockabason, 13 August 1994 (Spinney Collection, excerpt).

told that it was used to start an occasion of dancing by Penobscot singers. I have observed (and participated) in Snake Dances midway through an evening of social dancing during intertribal gatherings. Joseph A. Nicholas chose the Snake Dance to end the Sipayik Ceremonial Day when he was the master of ceremonies, because it was a nice way to connect with the audience, who were asked to participate.

HISTORICAL DESCRIPTIONS Speck on the Penobscot Snake Dance In the early twentieth century Frank Speck noted that the Snake Dance, (pe)matagi'posi, was performed for weddings at Indian Island by Penob­ scot singers and dancers. It followed the Wedding , a special dance whose squadron formations represent the families involved in the 338 ANN MORRISON SPINNEY wedding. The name described the movement: he gave the literal transla­ tion "coming creeping along the ground" (Speck 1940:257, 283). Speck provided conflicting information about this dance. He noted that there were two names for it: the one given above, which is descriptive, and "Yuneha", after its predominant syllables. When first introducing peme- ge 'wintowa 'gan dance songs, he described their effect as hilarious (Speck 1940:166), but later suggested that "anciently" the Snake Dance was done to imitate the movement of a serpent constellation (1940:284). Speck recorded six Penobscot Snake Dance songs; I shall discuss their melodies and texts in detail in the analytical portion of this paper. Only two transcriptions appear in his book; as some of the cylinders in the collection are broken, it cannot be ascertained what their source recordings are. Both of the transcribed songs appear to be fast dance songs. At several points, Speck (1940:284) described the complexity of the rhythm in this dance: "The song is entirely independent, in times of the rattling [accompaniment] and stamping [of the dancers]". The quintessential accompaniment for this dance was the shot horn rattle, halonossis. On the recordings from the Speck collection, one can hear a lot of noise over the singing. While presumably this is partly the noise of the recording machine, one Penobscot elder and several Passama­ quoddy singers have told me that the rhythm of this noise sounds like the way dance leaders used to beat the rattle for this dance. It is rhythmic, setting a pulse of sixteenth notes under the uneven duple and triple groupings of the sung melody. I have tentatively identified cylinder number 5046 as the source of the transcription in Speck (1940:284) — it is at least a close variant. I have re- transcribed the song following current conventions here (see Transcrip­ tion 2).

Fewkes on the Passamaquoddy Snake Dance Jesse Walter Fewkes, despite being the firstt o record Passamaquoddy Snake Dance songs along with a description of the dance in 1890, also reported conflicting ideas about the dance. The dance described to him by Noel Josephs, Peter Selmore and Mrs. W. Wallace Brown is the same as that described by Speck and observed later by Nicholas Smith and myself. He recorded several Snake Dance songs, which he was told were different; however, he considered them all DANCE SONGS AND INTERCULTURAL INFLUENCE 339

-1 ^™ «— Va " =XZ m -i—\ =E ?Y>m »? ^E Yu ne ha vu ne yu ne ha yu ne yu ne ha yu

7 fe ^ i« 1 ?"""! ' yu ne ha yu ne * yu ne ha yu ne (recording off track)

* 1>» • I. I" ^ I. |>, =^ S yu ne ha >u ne vu ne ha vu ne yu ne ha yu ne

(end) 7= -*—•- 7* 377E ' ' U-^-5 vu ne ha vu ne vu ne ha vu ne yu ne ha 7=yu n7e

Repeal J or 4 times. 7G^ :.^ the-H-daJ Segno, trom D.S. 7 times•mesrt, :conclu ^ ding at end of line 4 yu ne ha yu ne vu ne ha vu ne

Transcription 2. Penobscot Snake Dance (Speck Collection, cylinder 5046).

to be variations of one song and only presented one transcription (Fewkes 1890:261). Because Fewkes's recordings of the Snake Dance songs were the first fieldrecording s made, they are famous; famously absent for decades until transferred to the Library of Congress, but included on the Spottswood collection of American folk songs put out by the library in the 1970s (Spottswood 1978). Fewkes thought that this song and the dance were extremely ancient: Although the ceremonial element has now disappeared from this song, it may be presumed that it originally had a religious importance similar to that of the Snake Dances of the Southwest, since the extent of the worship of the snake among North American Indians is known. [Fewkes 1890: 261]. His cross-cultural connections in this article are not well supported - on another point, farewell customs, he drew connections to Italian! As further proof of the pedigree of the song and dance, Fewkes noted that a Snake Dance had been performed "by the Micmacs... during the past year" (Fewkes 1890:260). Along with his own speculation, Fewkes relayed the information on the song's use given by singers Noel Josephs and Peter Selmore. The dance 340 ANN MORRISON SPINNEY

Pan I

^ WMIe a khnu \,iya nr\\i \ICKya ha hiu i vyaa ni he We hu ya ha hi ni

m 4 ' • —»— i 1 he we he va ha hu We ho Pan:

Yu ne ha yu ne ha vu ne ha - yu ne- -ha vu ne ha vu ne ha Transcription 3. Passamaquoddy Snake Dance song, sung by Noel Josephs (Fewkes Collection, cylinder 10).2 always occurred at the end of the Passamaquoddy dances, though it might be followed by other dances. (Perhaps this could be glossed as occurring at the end of the Passamaquoddy ceremonial dances, followed by intertribal social dances.) He described in detail the actions of the leader: The leader or singer... begins the dance by moving about the room in a stooping posture, shaking in his hand a rattle made of horn, beating the ground violently with one foot. He peers into every corner of the room, either seeking the snake or inciting the on-lookers to take part, meanwhile singing the first part of the song recorded on the phonograph [see Transcription 3]. Then he goes to the middle of the room, and, calling out one after another of the auditors, seizes his hands. The two... dance around the room together... others join until there is a continuous line of men and women, alternate members of the chain facing in opposite directions, and all grasping each other's hands. The chain then coils back and forth round the room and at last forms a closely pressed spiral, tightly coiled together, with the leader in the middle. At first the dancers have their bodies bent over in a stooping attitude, but as the dance goes on they rise to an erect posture. They call on the spectators to follow them, with loud calls intermingled with the music... [Fewkes 1890:262] On the published recording of the song, Josephs prefaced his singing with an invitation to dance and a description of the good time to be had. Fewkes noted that the description given in the article was obtained from

2 Samuel P. Cheney, who transcribed the song melodies for Fewkes, had the initial section of his example beginning on E flat, and in the same key as the Sv^lT6 "• Ca?"u0t tdl if this ,s the same cy,inder as h,s example: Fewkes XiJj VT?°nS ^ Tg WCre the Same' and d,d not state wh'ch one was sSfon Hoi IT !??V .diSt°rti0nm the C°Py l °btained' brin8,ng the ™tial section down one halftone; I have transcnbed it as it is on my source. On the other hand, Cheney may have tned to "normalize" the key of the song by representing the two sections as in the same key. F'esenimgine DANCE SONGS AND INTERCULTURAL INFLUENCE 341

Mrs. W. Wallace Brown (rather than a transcription of Josephs's words), and that he himself had never seen the dance.

Hagar on the Micmac Snake Dance A few years later, Stansbury Hagar published a description of a Mi'kmaq Serpent Dance, also the subject of a recent article by Trudy Sable (1998). This dance had a slightly different formation: the dancers formed circles around the leader, and spent most of the dance coiling and uncoiling the line. It was associated with spring and with gathering medicine. No songs were recorded, but the use of a shot horn rattle for accompaniment was documented (Hagar 1895).

STRUCTURE OF THE SNAKE DANCE The division of the Snake Dance song into a slow introduction and a fast dance tune is typical of many of the Passamaquoddy ceremonial songs. One example is the Greeting Dance between two tribal leaders, which begins with the slow song "E, qanute" and concludes with fast dance songs, often with extemporized texts. An Abenaki singer I consulted advised me that this is typical of their ceremonial songs as well, and explained that the first part is supposed to get everyone focused on the ceremony. Altogether, the evidence seems to support Fewkes's idea that this was an old song at the time he recorded it. He does mention that "the boister­ ous finale may be of modern date." Perhaps it was only this "finale" portion that Speck was describing, though he was cognizant of the division into slow and fast sections of other ceremonial songs (cp. his discussion of the Penobscot Greeting Chant). Historical sources before Fewkes do not contain evidence of this kind of spiraling dance among Wabanaki people, though other social and ceremonial dances are described in detail in European accounts from the 17th century on.

CROSS-CULTURAL QUESTIONS This Snake Dance form is not unlike the Friendly Dances of the intertribal powwow, an event which has origins in the ceremonial traditions of midwestern and eastern nations brought together in reservations in the 19th century. The Oklahoma powwows began in the late 19th century; it is possible that there is a between the popularity of Friendly Dances and the documented public performances of Snake Dances in 342 ANN MORRISON SPINNEY

Passamaquoddy, Mi'kmaq and Penobscot communities. According to Cherokee ethnomusicologist Charlotte Heth (1982), a document from the early 19th century describes a Snake Dance among the Eastern Cherokee, the majority of whom were relocated to Oklahoma in 1838-39. Willard Rhodes (1987:14) noted that the Cherokee ceremonial Stomp Dance "was a serpentine in which the dancers follow the leaders as they wind the line into an ever-narrowing circle". On the other hand, if at the time Fewkes made his recordings people in Mi'kmaq communities were doing a similar dance, it is possible that the dance may have come from the East to the Passamaquoddy and Penobscot communities. It could be an imitation of the Mi'kmaq dance described by Hagar. Another vigorous Penobscot social dance that Speck recorded and described was attributed to the Mi'kmaqs: the Nawadawe or Micmac Dance. This dance song often used variations of the melody known to Passamaquoddy people as "Tuhtuwas" (Speck 1940:286-8). It was a free­ style men's dance with a strong uneven rhythm supposedly imitating Mi'kmaq dance style. Some of my older Passamaquoddy consultants found the idea of "dancing like Mi'kmaqs" very funny — an example of intertribal humor. Speck (1940:286) noted, "The dance seems to be purely for amusement, a conclusion to festivities; the noise and exuberance of the occasion culminating in a grand finale". The name means "", however. A third possibility — not exclusive of either of the previous two — is that this particular form of Snake Dance is an intertribal dance dating from activities of the Wabanaki confederacy and related alliances. From this perspective, the similarity of its form to that of the Cherokee Stomp Dance is particularly interesting.

THE INDIVIDUAL (SOLO) SNAKE DANCE David A. Francis, the Passamaquoddy language specialist suggests that there may be two kinds of Passamaquoddy Snake Dances, perhaps with different origins. In the 1930s, an elder took him aside and showed him a special Snake Dance, along with a hunting dance. The Hunting Dance was a pantomime of following a trail around the ground, then pouncing on the prey and dancing in exultation of achievement. This dance is still done today by Dwayne Sockabasin and his son. The Snake Dance that the elder taught David Francis along with the Hunting Dance may also be a DANCE SONGS AND INTERCULTURAL INFLUENCE 343 pantomime. It is a , completely unlike the group snake dance described above. Francis describes it as "like the Highland Scots sword dance". He suggests that it could be imitating a person trying to step out of a tangle of snakes — "it would get you out of it", he noted in one consultation. He suggests it might have seasonal connections to spring, when tangles of snakes are found lying in the sun. Analyzing the implica­ tions of a similar seasonal association for the Mi'kmaq Serpent Dance, Trudy Sable (1998) concluded that that dance had associations with the gathering and administration of medicine. Unfortunately, David Frances cannot remember the song that went with this solo dance and according to consultants no one in the Passamaquoddy community has performed the dance since.

LINGUISTIC EVIDENCE The Passamaquoddy word for 'snake' is athusoss, the Penobscot, athossis. The Mi'kmaq words for 'snake' and 'snaking' are quite different (Sable 1998:332). Blanche Sockabason employed the word athusoss in her extemporized Snake Dance song text as she directed and responded to the dancers in August 1994 (see Transcription 1). This example is typical of her artistic approach to this dance song. The text al-la-de-gee-eh that Nicholas Smith (1955:34) found on the Speck recording3 of Maliseet singer Jack Solomon was recognized by David Francis as a typical Passamaquoddy Snake Dance song refrain: wolatokiye 'they are straightening out'. This word suggests a connection to the second part of the Penobscot Green Corn Dance, which uses this text; I am currently considering this association and connections with Long- house ceremonies. Sable (1998) points out that the Mi'kmaq word for 'crawling around', alatejiey, is similar, though it has a different ending. The texts of Noel Josephs's Snake Dance songs consist of the word or vocableyuneha, repeated (Fewkes 1890:262). This text is described as an archaic chant syllable by all of my Passamaquoddy consultants. The text of the ceremonial Passamaquoddy Greeting Chant "E, qanute" is in the same category. Qanute may be an Iroquoian word — it is found in several of the longhouse ceremonial songs recorded by Fenton. It suggests another intertribal ceremonial connection. I am currently investigating these

3 This cylinder in the Speck collection is now broken. 344 ANN MORRISON SPINNEY

Part One Drumming: irregular Sinmng: intermittent, repeanng the phrases several times, with interjections Indistinct text i A '. .s . .1 ' .":• > .s r~rr

Part Two. Drumming: regular, approx. quarter notes. Repeated several times. Singing: independent of drumming. wth intenections. i^-i $ - rrr^^^^^iijf m- \ -^-)*- a yrrf y i r f Haye he ha ye he. ha ye he, ha ye he. Have he ha yehe, ha ye he ho

Part Three. /etc.) Drumming comtnues. I a 0 \ a • | | | ! I 1 I o m » \ ' ' " 0 —0-9-- indistinct text, intermittent., with spoken interjections.

Transcription 4. Maliseet Snake Dance song (Mechling Collection, no. 8). connections, research that happily coincides with that of several other scholars (Bruce Bourque, Willard Walker and Fred Wiseman) as well as Wabanaki leaders, into the history of the Wabanaki confederacy. Some of my Passamaquoddy consultants speak of Yuneha songs as an old, and important, genre. Speck noted that this was another term applied to the Penobscot Snake Dance songs, though in the notes to his collection of recordings (Speck 1905-11) he lists both "Snake Dance" and "Yaumho Dance" as though they were not interchangeable categories.

MUSICAL ANALYSES Analysis of the melodies and texts of the available historical Snake Dance song recordings has led me to some preliminary conclusions about this song and dance genre and its cultural functions. The melodic contour of the firstsectio n of Noel Josephs's song (Transcription 3) is a falling fourth, made up of a second and a minor third. It is sung in slow duration. In the melody of Speck's Snake Dance (Tran­ scription 2), the firstphras e features a rising fourth, including a minor third and a second. This is the inversion of Josephs's song motive. Five Snake Dance songs sung by Maliseet singers were recorded by William Hubbs Mechling around the same time that Speck made his recordings. Although we know much less about the contexts of these songs - Mechlmg's work on songs was never published and is believed lost — DANCE SONGS AND INTERCULTURAL INFLUENCE 345

Part 1 Drumming, eighth notes, evenly I recording skips) 3^S

He wa he ka ya he

Part 2 Drumming continued 1, >v N N ^ s 7 ^^

we he ya wee he ya we he ya we he ya we he ya wee he ya we he ya we he ya

Sung 2 times, renim to Pan 1

^ Z we heyavee he ya we he ya wee he ya

Transcription 5. Maliseet Snake Dance song (Mechling Collection, no. 13). some similarities appear. Three of the songs identified as Snake Dance songs in the collection share a similar melodic outline in what seems to be the second of their multiple sections: cylinder 8 (Transcription 4, part 2); cylinder 13 (Transcription 5, part 2); and cylinder 25 (Transcription 6, part 2). In cylinders 8 and 25 these sections share the range of a sixth; cylinder 13 emphasizes this range except for the intermediate phrase endings on low C sharp. All three segments share the same pentatomc scale form of tonic, minor third, two major seconds, with the subtonic a major second below.4 The tunes are close enough to be related, and perhaps are variants of a melodic family. All three examples emphasize the opening interval of the major third; the tonic is a minor third below the opening. In scale structure, they are similar to Speck cylinder 5046 (Transcription 2). Even if the structures of these opening phrase motives are vestiges of an archaic pentatomc melodic system, this in itself is interesting given the presence of other pitches outside the pentatonic scale in these songs. The recorded versions could be elaborations of an older basic melodic type. The texts are similar to that of part 1 of Noel Josephs's Snake Dance song (Tran­ scription 3). Of the other Snake Dance songs in the Speck and Mechling collections Mechling cylinder 19 (Transcription 7) and cylinder 36 share melodies and

4 On the piano this matches the following sequence of white keys: C, D, F, G, A, with Das tonic. w _J:::.. I':Ht I . rtcclv. 110 drnm 0\ ~~~~~J~J!Lt)~ ~:1~#J~~~:~D~~Ml~-~-1$~ty~ JI:~J ~ ~ -~~ 1

lie ga kl11 01 hi ni sa u va we la hu na sa yet wa In g1n1 hi ni sa R ya \H' 10 hu 11:1 c;a ya

=--f~- ]:====- ~~ ----=-H=ijjt~- - =-~Hf- ----~- ===-- ~.)-~-~-=:-- ~±-~~1/E_::_a.-- ~---=- 1-~- --=#~-lf- --=~- =- ~-- :-=-===-J = -=:-=--y-t-=====---- -.:::- - _- :· ==~-- =-----=~- ·=· -_- ;: -- =- ~=·- ::-=·==:

~.__•· 0 flo ga we ~ :i-=J[= --=-3~= =~~ =~~~t::=H-=:: S:~3~F~~~~-~~~~~ ~ ;~-~i:: ±~ ~~-=:~~ ~l ~ : ~ :-: --:-fr=---_;1-r=~±~=-= :r: · - · - ~-_1'!'._-=rE_If_ - f!'.. --G~ ·~ : -~~:= ~ t::. ______-- -- __-.1 _'---J--- . , ~ - l- - ~ _] 0

llo ga wi d3 ho o ya n<: , W(' ga gi ni hi ni ~a a yn hega gona hn ~n ya, wq;a kt ni ho nn ~a ya CZl~ 0 Pari 2 Repealed 5 limes z CZl nl1 - ~~ ~:.i --)-,- -- r:t-- --- ~ ---1---ffl------N =- 1-. --~~ ---t--- '"0 --- tr ~ - F ~ = ~ ~ -= ~ -;;;_ -·::t :-= - =- :_ =- -: _:::::: _ =-:!-=~~~'iF _ -~ ::- ~- -~-w: ~ - _:.:::------>~ ::- 31 1 -. ~ .. l ------f::::L--F-c ·-- _]_ - ;~ n ------F-L-P--c· --- j -- ·e; j -- }. L - ~ t We he ye wee he yaa, we he yh we he ya We he ya we he yn we he ya we he ya tT'l -< Pari .1 Repealed .llimcs (reco rding hrc~k s e>fl) ~ . ~~ li 'J.~~~~ ,~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~=~~,~~:~~cc= ~~= j~~~~=·~~~

Transcription 6. Maliseet Snake Dance (Mechling Collection no. 25). DANCE SONGS AND INTERCULTURAL INFLUENCE 347

Drumming: evenly in eighth notes

He havdine haw dine e e, He haw dine hawdi ne (Vocables alternate with extemporized text.)

Transcription 7. Maliseet Snake Dance song (Mechling Collection no. 19). texts; the melodies are similar to that of a War Dance song in the collection. They are fast and consist of short phrases, repeated. Speck cylinders 5060 ("First Dance") and 5061 ("Yauniho Dance") both share the text yuneha, yauniho and have similar melodies. The second phrases of these melodies are similar to the closing phrase of the Greeting Chant "E, qanute". A feature is the play with emphasis between the syllables of the text: yuneha, yauniho. Both songs were sung by a Penobscot singer, and are followed by a Wedding Dance of the social type. Speck (1940) did not include a description of what a "Yauniho Dance" was, nor any analysis of this type of song in his book. I suspect that these are the fast segments of Snake Dance songs as done at weddings, a usage Speck does discuss. "Yauniho" is the first of the pemege 'wintowahgan 'dance song' (sic) refrains presented in the discussion of social dances in Penobscot Man (Speck 1940:167). The presentation of these recordings in the Speck collection — the "First Dance" and "Yauniho Dance" sung with a Wedding Dance song — and their use of the archaic vocables Speck later transcribed as yuneha both suggest that they are all connected to the marriage ceremony, one of the Wampum ceremonies (Leavitt and Francis 1990). Nicholas Smith recorded Andrew Dana singing a Penobscot Snake Dance song in the 1950s; his song (Smith no. 27) is also in two parts, the first slow and the second fast. The opening of the slow part shares the melody of Speck cylinder 5046 (Transcription 2), rising a minor third plus a second before falling back by thirds to a fifth,on e step below the starting pitch. Smith also recorded singers from another family singing a Snake Dance song that is a version of this same slow melody. A Penobscot elder I consulted recently indicated that this is a very old song. A variant of this version is today sung for healing and for prayers on various occasions in the Sipayik community. According to one singer, it was taught to the women of the community by a Mi'kmaq elder. This suggests that the tune is known in all three communities, and the healing property attributed to it 348 ANN MORRISON SPINNEY

Drum

m - I 7 • I» •*^7^f» t^Uj-g!ru "f t•},' .C^ >>'.'t«' f j Ha do pa da ha i yo ha i ye Ha do pa da ha i yo ha i ve Lead Chorus (etc.)

Transcription 8. Mte 'skmuey (Snake Dance song), Kitpu Singers (Denny Family Singers, n.d.). agrees with Sable's analysis of the Mi'kmaq Serpent Dance. Given its current use, a transcription of the song would be inappropriate. A recording by the Kitpu Singers of a Mi'kmaq Snake Dance song (Mte 'skmuey, Denny Family Singers n.d.) has an opening phrase that also follows the melody type of a minor third plus a second, descending like the Fewkes recording but with the intervals reversed (Transcription 8). It is sung first by a leader, answered by the chorus of drummers, and accompa­ nied by the large, stationary dance drum used for intertribal powwow songs. The antiphonal style of performance is similar to that of Cherokee Stomp Dance songs, rather than typical powwow songs.

CONCLUSIONS

The evidence from recordings suggests that Passamaquoddy, Penobscot and Maliseet Snake Dance songs formerly were two-part pieces: the first slow and unmeasured, the second fast with a strong beat and a polyrhyth- mic relationship between drumming, dancing, and text declamation. This two-part form of a slow song plus fast song for dancing is typical of other Wabanaki ceremonial songs, including those for the Wampum ceremonies, and suggests a connection between these genres, although the Snake Dance is usually described as a social dance. The melodies of the slow sections in particular show anhemitonic pentatomc structural characteristics and a prevalent motive of a fourth comprised of a minor third plus a major second (or vice versa), whether rising or falling in pitch. This interval structure is found in Passama­ quoddy, Maliseet and Penobscot Snake Dance songs recorded between 1890 and 1911, as well as in a contemporary Mi'kmaq recording. Over the past century, it seems that the two parts of the Snake Dance songs have become separated, the slow segment with its characteristic DANCE SONGS AND INTERCULTURAL INFLUENCE 349 melody being used for healing and the fast segments being incorporated into the group of those used for the ad hoc accompaniment of social dancing. Since many of these fast segments are tunes used for other dances in the historical recordings, they may already have been part of this group. The Kitpu Singers' example differs from other singers' use of "generic" dancing songs for the Snake Dance. Another element distinguishing both slow and fast Snake Dance song segments in Passamaquoddy and Penobscot repertories is the vocable yuneha, found in the examples recorded over a span of nearly 110 years. These syllables are considered archaic by consultants, and in this regard the songs are like Wabanaki Wampum ceremonial songs. The texts are not apparently related to words referring to snakes or snaking motions. The use of the Snake Dance to close Wampum ceremonies is docu­ mented by Speck, and reinforced in the public presentation devised by Joseph A. Nicholas. Similarities in the dance formation to the Cherokee Stomp Dance and contemporary intertribal Friendly Dances also suggest ceremonial origins. Fewkes, Hagar, Sable and others have suggested symbolic associations with this dance formation that go beyond sociality into the realm of medicine, healing and spiritual power. There is evidence of two kinds of Passamaquoddy dances associated with snakes: the group dance that goes snaking along and the solo dance that seems to imitate stepping over snakes. Where the serpentine social dance originated and how old it is are questions that have been raised recently by Passamaquoddy elders. For the Wabanaki area, the descrip­ tions published by Fewkes and Hagar seem to be the earliest documentation of its performance. However, the descriptions of other Wabanaki dance genres existing in the late 19th century are surprisingly similar to those from the 18th and even 17th centuries (Morrison 1997), suggesting that the serpentine Snake Dance could have been old long before the 1890s even though we have no earlier descriptions. The historical evidence, the symbolic associations of the movements, the existence of melodic types for the dance songs, and similarities with ceremonial dance traditions of other eastern peoples suggest avenues for further exploration into ceremonial connections between nations in the Eastern Woodlands area. 350 ANN MORRISON SPINNEY

REFERENCES Fenton, William N. 1942. Songs from the Iroquois Longhouse: program notes for an album of American Indian music from the Eastern Woodlands. Washington: Smith­ sonian Institution. Fewkes, Jesse Walter. 1890. A contribution to Passamaquoddy folk-lore. Journal of American Folk-Lore 3:257-280. Hagar, Stansbury T. 1895. Micmac customs and traditions. American Anthropologist o.s. 8:31-42. Heth, Charlotte. 1982. Can ethnohistory help the ethnomusicologist? American Indian Culture and Research Journal 6:63-78. Leavitt, Robert M., and David A. Francis, eds. 1990. Wapapi akonutomakonol: the wampum records: Wabanaki traditional laws. Fredericton: University of New Brunswick. Morrison, Ann [Spinney]. 1997. Music that moves between worlds: Passamaquoddy ceremonial songs in the culture history of the Northeast. Ph.D. thesis, Harvard University. Rhodes, Willard. 1987. Program notes to: Indian songs of today. Music of the American Indian, v. 3. Washington: Library of Congress. Sable, Trudy. 1998. Multiple layers of meaning in the Mi'kmaw Serpent Dance. Papers of the 28th Algonquian Conference, ed. by David H. Pentland (Winnipeg: University of Manitoba), 329-340. Smith, Nicholas N. 1955. Wabanaki dances. Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archeological Society 16(2):29-37. Speck, Frank G. 1940. Penobscot man. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

Recordings Denny Family Singers, n.d. Mi'kmaq chants. Kewniq Recordings Productions, SRC505 (cassette tape). Fenton, William N. 1942. Songs from the Iroquois Longhouse. Folk music of the United States. Library of Congress, AFS L6 (1942). Heth, Charlotte. 1985. Songs of the eastern Indians from Medicine Spring and Allegheny. New World Records, NW 337. Mechling, William Hubbs. 1911. Malicite and Micmac songs. Canadian Museum of Civilization, collection III-E-1. Smith, Nicholas N. n.d. Penobscot and Passamaquoddy songs. Canadian Museum of Civilization, collection III-E-2. Speck, Frank G. 1905-11. Songs, various Native American groups. Indiana Archives of Traditional Music, collection 60-018-F. Spinney, Ann Morrison. 1995. Sipayik 30th annual Indian Day. Cassette tape in the Waponahki Museum, Perry, Maine. Spottswood, Richard K., ed. 1978. Folk music in America, v. 15: Religious music. Library of Congress, LBC15.