Native American Song at the Frontiers of Early Modern Music. Olivia A

254 MUSICultures 39 Native American Song at the informative. Both books are innovative in Frontiers of Early Modern Music. distinct ways. Olivia A. Bloechl. New Perspectives Bloechl’s work seeks a more balanced in Music History and Criticism. 2008. view of existing music history working Cambridge, UK & New York: Cambridge towards a “postcolonial musicology.” University Press. xxii, 279pp, black and Drawing on Foucault’s methods of white illustrations, music examples, genealogy and discourse analysis, she tables, notes, bibliography, index. examines how Native American traditions Hardback, £59.00. influenced English and French musical traditions during the seventeenth and Music of the First Nations: eighteenth centuries. She argues that Tradition and Innovation in North colonial musical encounters between America. Tara Browner, ed. 2009. the English and French and Indigenous Urbana: University of Illinois Press. peoples in eastern North America, and 184pp, black and white illustrations, to some extent in parts of the Caribbean black and white photographs, maps, and northeastern South America, also contributors, index. Cloth, $37.00. influenced European musical traditions. This position reverses the more typical ANNETTE CHRETIEN approach to the study of Indigenous musics Wilfrid Laurier University that tends to focus on how Indigenous musical practices have been influenced by The need for more, and more detailed, European musical concepts and practices, information on the musical traditions and as well as by colonial values. practices of Indigenous peoples in North The book is divided into two main America has not waned in the twenty-first sections: the first deals with sacred music century. In fact, as Tara Browner notes, in the New World, and the second with research in this area has actually decreased issues of representation in French and in recent years. Browner attributes this English music. In “Part I: Transatlantic decrease to various issues ranging from Savagery,” Bloechl examines how lack of funding to the changing attitudes of Protestant and Catholic music discourses those being “studied.” Further difficulties were influenced by Native American arise when considering how to position music. In “Part II: Staging the Indian,” music research within the relatively new she demonstrates how the exotifying field of Indigenous studies. There is no use of Native music in masques, ballets, doubt that part of the challenge facing and operas contributed to stereotypes of researchers of Indigenous musics is musical “savagery,” thereby reinforcing finding ways to address the wide diversity European notions of their own music as that exists, and the need for new ways more “civilized.” of approaching the specificities of each Bloechl incorporates musicological community and its musical practices. For sources such as scores, music theory, these reasons, the two books reviewed composers’ writings, music criticism, here are welcome additions to the and iconography with less typical literature which many will find useful and sources for musical analysis such as travel Book Reviews 255 writings, religious prints, demonology, were asked to perform for the specific and prophetic writings. This book is a purpose of being recorded). She discusses welcome re-interpretation of primary the impact of the recording methodology and secondary documents that have on performance of the songs, including contributed significantly to stereotypical changes in structure, text, and the notions of Indigenous musical practices. compositional process itself. She also I do have some reservations about touches on many aspects of drum- Bloechl’s contribution to historical dance songs such as drum construction, musicology. Although the subject matter song subjects (such as hunting), and the and argument are compelling, the writing function of certain categories such as style is dry, dense and not particularly song duels. Drum-dance songs can range engaging. The deconstructionist approach in function from social humiliation to is more suitable for graduate students, dispute resolution. Conlon’s analysis is or at least readers who are well versed brief but provides an introduction to the in Derrida’s notions of différance, than to genre. Similarly, David Draper’s article the general reader. Moreover, the issue on Choctaw social dances provides a of cultural appropriation is not addressed comparative analysis of six songs focusing despite claims to a “postcolonial” approach. on their salient features. This book is not easily accessible to those Lucy Lafferty and Elaine Keillor non-academics who might be interested take a very different approach to the in the subject of Indigenous musics. interpretation of early recordings. This By contrast, Music of the First Nations: collaborative effort between a Native and Tradition and Innovation in North America non-Native scholar examines 33 Dene presents a much more accessible view songs recorded between 1913 and 1955. of “tradition and innovation” throughout The authors’ emphasis is on how Dogrib its range of subjects and approaches. “land songs” and “love songs” reinforce Browner’s book features nine case studies, Dene personal relationships to oneself, each by different authors using different others, and the land. Although brief in research methods, and representing its analysis, the article does demonstrate different nations and tribes. Seldom do the importance of the learning process in we find such a wide range of research constructing meaning in an Indigenous approaches in the same collection. musical culture. Dene history and values Each essay is devoted to specific issues are reinforced through the process related to the Indigenous people being of learning these songs, by listening, discussed, and each is an example of how watching, and doing throughout one’s contemporary ethnomusicologists might life. The message here is that these songs approach research in these contexts. Each must be examined in context to be fully article also illustrates the challenges of appreciated and understood. research in Indigenous musical practices. Laurel Sercombe’s contribution Paula Conlon’s article on Inuit further emphasizes the importance drum-dance songs highlights issues in of context and performance practice interpreting “artificial recordings” (staged in Indigenous cultures through an field recordings for which the singers examination of myth narratives and song 256 MUSICultures 39 from the western Washington Coast Salish both Canada and the U.S. In contrast to in the Puget Sound region. Her discussion Bloechl’s book, there is more emphasis of the myth narrative known as “Dirty on Native participation in the research Face” is based on a number of recorded process, and on how research can be and published versions of the power useful to communities beyond the songs as well as the story. She discusses academic community. There are some the intimate relationship between song shortcomings in this approach, namely the and storytelling in performance, and the lack of detailed analyses; a sense that some accompanying shift in meaning when the articles are conservative or dated in their narrative moves to the “sung language.” approach; and a disconnected tone to the The myth narrative also carries deeper book as whole. meaning than its overt subject of personal All in all, however, both books cleanliness; it is about appropriate social are well worth the read for those behaviour, and it is a teaching tool for interested in current research on Native family and community relations. North American musical practices In contrast to the more traditional and traditions. I would suggest that musicological approaches used in the first Bloechl’s work is better suited to sections of this anthology, ethnographic graduate students and others interested methods predominate in the rest. in musicology. Browner’s book can serve Franziska von Rosen’s conversations as an introduction to Indigenous musics with traditional Passamaquoddy singer for undergraduates or even the general Margaret Paul are particularly interesting. public. I would even suggest reading both Featuring the use of the dialogic method books “side by each” (as we say where I pioneered by ethnomusicologist Judith come from), which would highlight the Vander, von Rosen’s interview with Paul theoretical and methodological challenges is presented without much interpretation in researching Native musics, and some or analysis, although as Browner indicates of the ways in which these challenges are in her introduction, von Rosen does currently being met. “guide” the interview to some extent.1 Browner’s own contribution is a reminder of the importance of studying regional styles of music. Her approach is rooted Musique et globalisation : in a “deep listening for musical elements” musicologie-ethnomusicologie. in vocal performances of intertribal pow- Jacques Bouët et Makis Solomos (dirs). wow songs. 2011. Paris : L’Harmattan. 286 pp, This collection of essays encompasses illustrations, exemples musicaux, the perspectives of both Native and bibliographie. non-Native scholars while spanning music practices and communities in YARA EL-GHADBAN University of the Witwatersrand 1 See Vander’s book Songprints: The Musical Experience of Five Shoshone Women. L’idée de l’ouvrage est attrayante : réunir 1988. Urbana: University of Illinois autour de la table des musicologues et Press. .

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