Native American Journeys
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NATIVEAMERICAN by Kyle MacMillan JOURNEYS 36 symphony MAY–JUNE 2009 IN MARK GREY’s Enemy Slayer: A Navajo Oratorio, ancient Navajo cleansing rites fuse with contemporary classi- cal music. Based on the Navajo Enemy Way (Anna’jí) Cer- emony, the 70-minute oratorio portrays the spiritual struggle and eventual reconciliation of a returning war veteran. “Nihiyázhí nílí (You are our beloved child),” cries the cho- rus, representing the commu- nity. Grey offers distant echoes but no direct quotations of the tribe’s music, sculpting a suit- ably sacred musical setting for Navajo poet Laura Tohe’s elo- quent libretto. At the work’s premiere by The Phoenix Symphony in February 2008, projected photographs of Navajo sacred sites by Deborah O’Grady added a visual dimen- sion. “I did cry several times during the oratorio, because although the music was very different from what I listen to, it told a story with which I am very familiar,” wrote Marly Shebala, a reporter for the Navajo Times who had never attended a classical- music concert before. The performances drew non-Navajo and Navajo audiences alike, with one tribal leader calling it one of the great experiences of his life. Cross-cultural works like Enemy Slayer are becoming increasingly common in the symphonic world, as more composers seek to draw on the rich, largely untapped well Amy Mills led the April 2008 world premiere of Bill Miller’s The Last Stand with Wisconsin’s La of traditional Indian music. (Many Native Crosse Symphony Orchestra, the Battle Point Singers (right), Miller (left, playing drum), and Americans currently use such terms as performer Lance Tallmadge (with spread arms center stage). In March 2009, Miller became the “Native American” and “American Indian” first Native American to perform with a symphony orchestra in Israel, when he joined the Israel Kibbutz Orchestra for six performances of the work. interchangeably.) At the same time, such ational Museum of the American Indian and David J. Marcou N pieces allow orchestras to reach out to by Kyle MacMillan neglected segments of their communi- NATIVE Can a symphony orchestra embrace music ties and provide mainstream audiences a musical bridge to a still little-known, of this nation’s indigenous cultures? It’s a often-overlooked part of America. Classi- proposition based on mutual respect, and cal works that in some way engage Native American themes and musical idioms date composers of European and Native American back to the nineteenth century, as compos- heritage are making the attempt. ers sought to answer Antonín Dvorák’s call americanorchestras.org 37 Georgia Wettlin- Larsen, program director of the First Nations Composer Initiative, has been performing and lecturing on American Indian music since the 1970s. I’m just being very on-the-sleeve about doing it.” The recent surge in works with Indian themes can be attributed to a combina- The recent tion of factors, beginning with contempo- surge in works rary composers’ hunger for new, unusual sounds. Internet sites such as iTunes have with Indian made it easier for them and their coun- themes can terparts in other genres to jump back in time or circle the planet in search of raw be attributed materials for their music. More and more to factors composers, such as Fleischer, are realizing that include that some of the richest and least tapped Enemy Slayer sources for such material are the diverse, composer Mark composers’ centuries-old musical traditions of Ameri- Grey and librettist can Indians. “I’m profoundly moved by the Laura Tohe hunger for new, honesty and intensity that I find in Native unusual sounds. American music, the intensity of the chant, the drum music, the haunting beauty of for a uniquely American musical aesthetic. Harth-Bedoya’s Caminos del Inka project, the native flute, and the whole nature of He urged them to draw on such innate which premiered at the Fort Worth Sym- the way music functions in Native Ameri- traditions as American Indian music, but phony Orchestra in 2007. Harth-Bedoya’s can culture,” says Fleischer, whose Indian- the harmful results of such appropria- project is not focused specifically on indig- inspired work, Echoes, was premiered in tion became clear with the romanticized enous music, but draws inspiration from October 2008 by the Anchorage Sym- musical stereotypes that often resulted. the ancient Inca trails that crisscross six phony Orchestra, where Fleischer is music Most non-Indian composers today are contemporary South American countries. director. more sensitive to the Indian cultures they The past five years have seen the rise of For symphony orchestras, commission- embrace and strive for authenticity, but the significant Indian composers who, follow- ing and performing such works is part of dangers of stereotyping and cultural viola- ing a trail blazed by Louis Ballard, focus a larger, ongoing effort to connect with tion remain. on the classical realm. Among the best under-served groups of all kinds, includ- If interactions between classical and known is Tate, a member of the Chickasaw ing African Americans and Latinos. These Indian music are not exactly new, recently nation, whose works have been performed organizations realize that they have to go there has been an unprecedented burst by the Philadelphia Classical Symphony, beyond their traditional constituencies of such works. In addition to Enemy National Symphony Orchestra, and Min- and build an audience that more closely Slayer and such pieces as Jerod Impich- nesota Civic Orchestra. He makes a point matches the ethnic and racial make-ups of chaachaaha’ Tate’s Nitoshi’ Imali, Randall of expressing his Indian heritage in every- their communities. To mark its 60th anni- Craig Fleischer’s Echoes, and Bill Miller’s thing he writes. “Debussy was definitely versary, The Phoenix Symphony commis- The Last Stand, there’s also Robert Kap- focused on being French,” Tate says. “He sioned Enemy Slayer from Grey, its Music ilow’s Summer Sun, Winter Moon—which is was very clear about it in his writing. So, Alive composer in residence, and sur- expected to be spotlighted in a documen- I’m just doing the same thing that he rounded the performances with multiple tary later this year on public television— and Bartók, and even Liszt, were doing. events devoted to Navajo culture. (Music and the Peruvian-born conductor Miguel Beethoven was very specifically German. Alive is a residency program of the League 38 symphony MAY–JUNE 2009 of American Orchestras and Meet The Kansas, chose Robert Kapilow to write a music and themes in an authentic, sensitive Composer.) The piece drew favorable cov- symphonic work to mark the 200th anni- way, he says, some works “over-romanticize erage in a series of articles in the Navajo versary of the Lewis and Clark Expedition and over-mystify” such elements and can Times, and at least 100 Navajo attended in 2004. The New Jersey composer first wind up offering a kind of stereotyped ver- the performances. “I had never seen so thought he would base his composition on sion of how outsiders think Indian music many native people in the symphony hall, the explorers’ diaries. When that idea did ought to sound. “At the end of the day, the and for some of them, it was the first time not pan out, he opted instead to follow the music speaks for itself, and bad music is bad they had ever been to any kind of a perfor- advice of historian Robert Archibald, head music,” Tate says. “Artistically, I keep my mance like this,” says Laura Tohe. of the bicentennial commemorations, and ears open and I try to keep an open mind.” explore the landmark undertaking from To avoid such stereotyping, Fleischer Crossover Challenges the American Indian perspective. worked hard to maintain the integrity of This cross-cultural music exchange has In 2003, Kapilow traveled also been helped by the increasing vis- to Montana to meet with ibility of Indian performers in mainstream the Circle of Tribal Advis- Jerod society, a trend bolstered by the eleven- ers, which Archibald had Impichchaachaaha' Tate, composer year-old Native American Music Awards assembled. They quickly made of Nitoshi’ Imali, or “Nammys.” High-profile Indian per- it clear that their ancestral premiered by formers such as singer and guitarist Joanne stories belonged to them and Civic Orchestra Shenandoah, flutist R. Carlos Nakai, and they did not intend to share of Minneapolis in Bill Miller, a Grammy Award-winning them. “I had the sudden real- October 2007 Mohican singer-songwriter, can be found ization that, in a weird way, I in folk, alternative rock, and world music. was Lewis and Clark all over In addition, all three have performed with again,” Kapilow recalls. “Once symphony orchestras, and Miller, working again, I’d be another white guy with two collaborators, wrote an orches- taking their stuff and using it tral work commissioned by the La Crosse for my own purposes without Symphony Orchestra in Wisconsin. Titled even realizing that this was in The Last Stand, it commemorates the fact what I would be doing.” Battle of Little Big Horn and includes the Chastened but nonetheless composer as soloist on the tiny bird flute intrigued by the people he and low-pitched double-drone flute. encountered, he set aside his Organizations such as the First Nations desire for source material and Composer Initiative, a branch of the stayed for the rest of the gath- American Composers Forum in St. Paul, ering simply to learn more. Minnesota, promote such crossover. Since During several subse- its founding in 2004, the FNCI has pro- quent visits to the Blackfoot vided funding for more than 35 new Indian Reservation in Mon- Indian works in genres ranging from clas- tana, Kapilow became good sical to hip-hop.