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Indian Blues: The Indigenization of American Popular Music

2009; University of Oklahoma; Volume: 83; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1353/wlt.2009.0185

1945-8134

John W. Troutman,

Music History and Culture

Indian Blues The Indigenization ofAmerican Popular Music Jo/m W. Troutman Native artists todayperform not onlyatpowwows butalso inrockand hip-hopclubs. Infact,American Indians have performed European andAfrican-derived musicfor centuries. Thefollowing essay revealsonefacet of thishistory, whenNative musicians turnedthe federalgovernment's"civilization" campaignon itshead, indigenizingthe music meant todetribalizethem. above The Navajo rock band Blackfire In 1955 anthropologist James Howard cast a dim light over the expressive culture of American Indians, remarking that powwows reflecta "process by which socio-cultural entities . . .are losing their tribaldistinctiveness and in its place are developing a nontribal Indian' culture."1 He believed thatAmerican Indian musical tradi tions were fast becoming generic, "pan-tribal" per formances that reflected a decreasing vitality and diversity of songs and dances. Any powwow sing er or dancer would immediately rejecthis analysis on the simple basis thattriballyspecific?and clan or family-specific?songs have vastly multiplied over thepast century, just as intertribalpowwow culture has proliferated to an extraordinary and quite heterogeneous degree. Yet equally profound in growth to powwow culture are theways in which American Indians have also manipulated 42 i World Literature Today Iand refiguredother formsofmusic, in theprocess developing new means within expressive culture toperform their identities as indigenous peoples. Just as the continued expanse of inter tribalpowwow culture has facilitated the sharing and development of new varieties of songs and dances, Native singers, musicians, and dancers of all varieties continue to access every available musical arena, including cyberspace. The Native American Music Awards, or "Nammys," are tell ing: they comprise over thirtygenres of music and provide awards ranging from best powwow and Native American Church recordings to best blues and hip-hop recordings. Indeed, many Native musicians have recognized popular music genres as opportunities to expand their tribal, oral traditions. For example, the 2008 Nammy Record of theYear award went to Blackfire's (Silence) Is a Weapon. The two-disc set is a tour de forceby these veteran "Alter-Native" and punk rockers from theDine Nation. They describe themselves on theirMySpace site as a "traditionally influ enced, high-energy, politically driven group com prised of two brothers and theirsister. Born into theheart of a political land dispute area on Black Mesa in the Navajo Nation, thisFamily's powerful music reflects the Hopes, Freedoms, and Barriers of today'sworld." Blackfire in facttours the world and has gained respect in many circles; their2002 album One Nation Under featured the last record ed vocals by punk legend Joey Ramone, and David Fricke, Rolling Stonemagazine's premier music critic,has promoted Blackfire in his col umns. (Silence) Is aWeapon consists of one disc of charging, protest rock-n-roll interlaced with Dine chants; the other disc is solely Dine ceremonial vocal and drum songs. Both discs suggest musi callywhat it means toBlackfire to beDine today, and the album demonstrates their extraordinary ability toweave thousands of years of ideas into one musical text. In effect, these artists have refig ured themeaning ofwhat constitutes their tribal, and indeed "Indian," music altogether. The practice by American Indians of fusing tribally derived music with that of Anglos and African Americans has existed for a very long time. Sacred music in missions and churches probably provided the first and certainly the longest-lasting variety of this blending of tradi tions, and the genres of American secular, popu larmusic have provided another. In the 1960s and 1970s, a number of Native musicians such as Cree singer Buffy Sainte-Marie, Kaw-Creek Saxophonist JimPepper, and Dakota singer Floyd Red Crow Westerman gained international fame for their rock, jazz, country, and folk recordings. These musicians and others gained an even high erprofile in the midst of theNative protestmove ments such as the takeover of Alcatraz Island, which captured the national media's attention at that time. Westerman's album Custer Died for Your Sins, for example, provided an equally scathing soundtrack forVine Deloria Jr/sgroundbreaking Nativepeoples forquite some timehad been blowing the saxophone, sawing the fiddle(or violin), and strumming guitars and mandolins. How theycame to those instruments and to these new styles ofmusic becomes particularly revealing when we considertheways in which thepracticeofmusic had become so divisively, politically charged in Indian Country inthe late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. 1969 "Indian manifesto...