Music--a marker of cultural identity as well as a common point for sharing
Alaska Native Language Center
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Tradition bearers - giving voice - to the various traditions
Music is central to the values and perspectives of all Alaskans' joys and sorrows
Alaska Native Culture
KYUK 640 AM/TV Alaska Public Radio and TV: http://www.kyuk.org
Serving the Yukon Kuskokwim Delta region of Southwest Alaska with on line streaming
in both English and Yupik from Bethel.
- Alaska & Polar Regions Collections
- Alaska & Polar Regions (APR) Collections acquires, preserves and provides access to materials
that document the past and present of Alaska and the polar regions, both Arctic and Antarctic.
Some Collections of Native Music and Recordings
The University of Alaska Fairbanks UAFRAS collection contains several hundred recordings
of music and interviews of Alaska Natives dating from the early 20th century.
An Inventory of Materials of Alaska Native Music prepared by Craig Coray, (2005)
Craig Coray has done extensive research on early field recordings of Alaska Native songs. Many,
complete with annotations and transcriptions, are now archived in the UAA/APU Consortium
Library. Coray is a respected lecturer in the field of Northern indigenous music and an authority
on the music of the Inland Dena'ina.
Audio Compact Discs: Total of 52
| Swanton, Sitka, 1904 |
8 discs |
| Davis, Juneau, 1920- |
2 discs |
| Chapman, Anvik, 1925 |
1 disc |
| Harrington, St. Paul, 1941 |
9 discs |
| Boulton, Barrow, 1946 |
3 discs |
| De Laguna, Angoon, 1950 |
1 disc |
| Rhodes, Utah, 1951 |
1 disc |
| De Laguna, Yakutat/Copper Valley, 1952/1958 |
12 discs |
| De Laguna, Yakutat/Copper Valley/Yukon Territory, 1954 |
10 discs |
| Morrison, Hydaburg, 1963 |
3 discs |
| Johnston lecture |
1 disc |
| VHS Tape: Bellinger, Juneau, 1986 |
1 tape |
Field Notes:
| De Laguna, 1950 |
11 pp. |
| De Laguna, 1952/1958 |
15 pp. |
| De Laguna, 1954 |
198 pp |
| Boulton, 1946 |
22 pp. |
| Catalogs/Synopses: Swanton, 1904 |
42 pp. |
| Folktales: Bellinger, 1986 |
14 pp. |
Transcriptions with Lyrics, Translations, and Synopses:
| De Laguna/McAllester, 1952/1954 (136 transcriptions) |
225 pp. |
| Johnston, Thomas, 1976 |
6 pp. |
Transcriptions without Lyrics, Translations or Synopses:
| Annotations: Craig Coray, 2005 |
91 pp., and 1 data disc |
.
The University of Alaska Anchorage Consortium Library is the custodian of this extensive collection
of field recordings of Alaska Native songs, interviews, and folklore. The original recordings are held
at the Library of Congress American Folklife Center. Copies were purchased in the fall of 2003 by
the UAA Music Department with a grant from the Rasmuson Foundation. Coray’s research and documentation
of these materials was made possible by a grant from the Alaska Humanities Forum.
The recordings are for on-site use only.
Craig Coray (2003-04) - Native Music from original recordings, many more than a century old,
gathered from the Harrimann Expedition of 1899, an Aleut song recorded on Unalaska Island by
the Polar Region Archive and the Native Language Center at UAF, the Archive of Traditional Music
at Indiana University, the Canadian Museum of Civilization in Quebec and tapes from his father's
collection of Dena'ina and Yup'k songs. (Bethel AK Tundra Drums, Dec. 18. 2003)
Craig Coray is currently (2007) working with French translators to make the following information available in English:
Sugpiaq Masks of Kodiak, Afognak and Alaska Peninsula in the Louis Alphonse Pinart Collection at
the Chateau Musee, Boulogne sur Mer, France. A book by Helen Simeonoff describes the Pinart collection
made in Kodiak in1872-1873. The collection includes numerous artifacts as well as masks. Pinart also took
detailed notes of dances that went with the masks and wrote down the lyrics in French. There are no recordings or
scores, but the collection is very significant because the traditional Sugpiaq culture was virtually extinguished
by the Russians and Americans.
- Davis, Carol Beery. 1984. Totem Echoes: A Collection of Authentic Southeast Alaskan Native
- Tunes. Compiled and arranged by Carol Beery Davis, assistant in arranging, Sylvia Audrey Davis.
First edition, special limited edition. Privately published in Juneau, Alaska, by the Miner Publishing
Company, 128 pages, illustrations, vintage b&w photographes and music. A valuable work on
musical ethnography, ethnology, and native folklore of Southeast Alaska, from Yakutat south
including Klukwan, Haines, Skagway, Juneau, Pelican, Hoonah, Chichagof, Tenakee Springs,
Chatham, Sitka, Angoon, Kake, Port Alexander, Petersburg, Wrangell, Klawock, Craig, Kasaan,
Ketchikan, and Metlakatla.
- _____. In the Shadow of the Totem. Tlingit Indian Folk Music arranged for SATB and Piano.
- First Part: Festive Dance and Second Part: Tom Tom Song
Oliver, Simon or Nutchuk (b. 1903). Son of a Norwegian father and Eskimo mother, he was
raised at the Jesse Lee Home in Unalaska, and worked in fishing industries on the Aleutians
and Arctic Coast. He later embarked on a career as a concert pianist in the lower 48, but gave
it up to research the rapidly vanishing music of the native people of the Aleutians Arctic coast.
Eskimo Bibliography in the University of Alaska campus in Kotzebue
Oswalt, Wendell H. Oswalt. Eskimos and Explorers. Novato, CA. Chandler & Sharp.1979
My Music Reaches to the Sky.
Native American Musical Instruments.
| |
The Kayak Paddlers’ Joy at the Weather
When I’m out of the house in the open,
I feel joy.
When I get out on the sea on haphazard
I feel joy.
If it is really fine weather,
I feel joy.
If it really clears nicely.
I feel joy.
May it continue thus!
for the good of my sealing!
May it continue thus
for the good of my hunting!
May it continue thus
for the good of my singing-match!
May it continue thus!
for the good of my drum-song. |
Ford Foundation and
Center for the Arts in Indian America, 1973
[Native Drums]
Native Drums: Questions and Answers
1) Drum used by the Native people are made of special materials, which have a special meaning:
a) Animal hides, which pay homage, in a sense, to the life forces of the animal world.
b) Woods to honor the growing things in Nature.
c) Pottery or metal, coming from the earth.
d) Water, the most precious element for all existence in life.
2) When are drums used by Native peoples?
Drums are never used just by themselves, but always to accompany singing or dancing.
3) How do you make different sounds on a drum?
Different sounds are made by different sizes and materials of the beaters, different sizes of
resonating chambers (the hollow air space).
4) What makes a drum sound?
The impact of the beater on the vibrator (head). This head or vibrator in turn sets in motion the air,
which vibrates and echos within and around the chamber. Our ears pick up these vibrations, which we hear as sound.
(Zagoskin, Lavrentii)
From Bruce Halderman’s Collection of 45s
John Angaiak - Two songs in Yupik Eskimo (written when he was a student in Fairbanks and
translated into English (Nasaureluma-My Girl and In Days of Old). This project came from
the Eskimo Language Workshop held in 1972 at the University of Alaska, College (Fairbanks),
Alaska.
| |
John Angaiak is a Yupik Eskimo
from the village of Tu
on Nelson Island in southeastern Alaska.
He is a student
at the University of Alaska
majoring in sociology and art.
John designed the album cover
wrote the words and music
accompanies himself on the guitar. |
In Days of Old (AK’A TAMAANI) [Sound]
In days of old
Our people were amazing.
The way they led their lives
In those days gone by.
So it was that their way
Would sometimes lead them into conflict
Even using bows and arrows.
Yai-ai. yai, .yai. yai, yai,
Yai. yai, yai. yai, yai,
On those day of old
The men of those times
Taught their children ways of battle.
How to use the bow and arrow
To advance and to attack.
They also taught them
In days of old.
Yai-ai. yai, .yai. yai, yai,
Yai. yai, yai. yai, yai,
And in days of old the shamans
Would use their special powers
To cure the vexing ills
That sometimes plagued the people.
It was indeed amazing
The way they led their lives
In days of old.
Yai-ai. yai, .yai. yai, yai,
Yai. yai, yai. yai, yai,
My Girl (Nasaureluma) [Sound]
My girl, my beautiful one
It makes me happy always to see you
For you are the only one I truly love.
You are the joy of my life,
Someday we shall meet by the river
And watch the birds in flight,
And watch the birds in flight.
Last night as I was sleeping
I dreamed about you.
We were together by ourselves
Sitting by the river watching the birds,
Sitting and watching the birds.
In the future, when the time comes
We shall see each other once again.
Oh, how I long to see you.
As I was sleeping
And dreaming of you
It seemed so real
As I was sleeping.
- I’m Lost in the City Yupik Eskimo JOHN ANGAIAK
- Amazing city I have found it to be, and the skies are full of mystery woe, woe, I'm lost in the
city. So sings John Angaiak a Yupik Eskimo from Nelson Island in southwestern Alaska, on
the first stereo album produced in Yupik and Eskimo by the University of Alaska's Eskimo
Language Workshop. The album, titled I'm Lost in the City is a first not only for the workshop,
but also for Angaiak, who wrote the music and lyrics for all the songs to sing himself.
- Yuarutet (Music in Yup'ik Eskimo) (1972)
- by Anna Alexie, John Angaiak , Mary Ann Lomack Molly Lomack, Elsie Mather, Marie Nick Sophie Parks, Martha Teeluk, authors and Paschal Afcan , Diane Dart, and Marsha Thompson illustrations.
- Field, Edward. 1967. Songs and Stories of the Netsilik Eskimos (from the Rasmussen
- Expedition).Fletcher, Alice C. 1900. Indian Story and Song from North America. (Totem Pole Cover).
Houston, James. 1972. Songs of the Dream People. Indian and Eskimo Chants.
- Johnson, Tom. 1976. Eskimo Music by Region. A Comparative Circumpolar Story. National
- Museum of Canada. Ottawa.
- _____. 1990. An Historical Survey of the Yupik Inviting-In Dance in Dance: in Current Selected
- Research, Vol. 2. New York: AMS Press.
- _____. “Tlingit Dance, Music and Society” in Acta Ethnographica. Acad. Sci, Hung. 1986-
- 1988, 34(1-4), 283-324.
- _____ and Tupou L. Pulu. n.d. Yup’ik Eskimo Songs. Materials Development Center, Rural
- Education, U. of Alaska.
- Mischler, Craig Wallace. 1981. Gwich’in Athapaskan Music and Dance: An Ethnography and
- Ethnohistory, Dr. phil. Diss. University of Texas at Austin.
- Pulu, Tupou L. n.d. Koyukon Athabaskan Dance Songs. A joint project of the National Bilingual
- Materials Development Center, U. of Alaska, Anchorage, and the Alaska State Department of Education. Songs provided by Madeline Solomon, music transcribed by Thomas Johnston,
song syllables transcribed by Eliza Jones illustrations by Dinah Stephenson.
- Roberts, Helen, and D. Jennes. 1925. Report of the Canadian Arctic Expedition. (Eskimo Songs)
.
- Recordings of Native Music
The Eskimos of Hudson Bay and Alaska. Recorded by Laura Boulton for Smithsonian - Folkways recordings (c. 2001). 1) Johnnie Bull Song 2) His First Hunt 3) All Songs have been
Exhausted 4) Hunting for Musk Ox 5) Hunting Seals 6) I Sing about a Dance 7) Before We Came
to this Region 8) Girls’ Game 9) Children’s Game 10) Bird Imitations 11) Walrus Imitations 12)
Animal Stories 13) Hunting Song 14) Dance Songs 15) Story Songs 16) Dance Songs 17) Inviting
a Dance Song 18) Dance Song 19) Dance Song
- Haida: Indian Music of the Pacific Northwest. Smithsonian Folkways. (2 CDs).
- 20) Celebration Song 21) Lullaby Song 22) Marriage Song 23) Children’s Song
24) Neyland’s Pride Song 25) Welcome Dance/Edenshaw’s Potlatch 26) Dialogue
27) Welcome Dance/Edensshaw’s Potlatch 28) Tsimshian Song 29) Dialogue
- Eskimos Songs from Alaska. Smithsonian Folkways (c. 2001).
- Small Owl 2) How Much Will I Get for The Ivory Carving 3) Looking for Someone Who Wants
to Eskimo Dance 4) Balloon Song 5) Walking from Savoonga to Gambell 6) Cowboy Song
7) Praise, Praise God 8) Helicopter Song/Second Helicopter Song 9) Drum Song 10) Like a
Little Girl 11) Little Indian Boy 12) Indian Exhausted 13) Rise Up Helicopter, Like a Bird 14) Guitar
Song 15) Eskimo Rock ‘n’ Roll 16) Little Cowboy 17) Swing your Drum 18) I Couldn’t Wait
19) Old Song
- Gathering: Native Alaskan Music and Words. Recorded by Kristi Olson for Nightworks
- Records, Anchorage, Alaska, 2000. 1) Introduction: The Gathering
2) Ciuliamta – The Miracle Drummers and Dancers 3) Strangers – Bunny Swan 4) Mable Pike, Tlingit Elder
5) Thousands of Years of Love – Medicine Dream 6) The Gathering Song – Jack Dalton
7) Yaqullpak – The Miracle Drummers and Dancers 8) Ktaqmkuk (Over the Waves) – Medicine Dream
9) Petals/Asa’s Song – Uncle Walter Austin, Tlingit Elder with Sleeping Lady 10) Lucille Davis, Alutiq Elder
11) Girl from Yakutat – Mark Brown 12) Blessing – Kenny Timberwolf with Tim Crawford
- Koyukuk River Songs from Allakaket, Hughes, Husia and Koyukuk. Song sheets and an
- accompanying
CD of songs by Native elders, some from village potlatches and others from the UAF, Oral History
Archives. The collection was made so that the songs will be passed on to future generations for
educational purposes. Yukon-Koyukuk School District, 4762 Old Airport Way, Fairbanks, AK 99709.
- Pat Wade Sings. Three songs recorded March 8, 2005 in Chickaloon, Alaska, in Ahtna, a
- highly endangered language.
Athabascan Music and Gwich’in Fiddling
http://www.fiddlechicks.com/athabascan/musicians.htm
“Lively tunes...were introduced to the Indians of Alaska in the late 1840's brought to the Interior by traders
of the Hudson's Bay Company. Since coming from their homelands in the Orkney Islands, Scotland, Ireland and
French-Canada the music they brought with them influenced the music that remains near and dear to the very heart
of what traditional Athabascan music embodies. Later during the gold rush, popular waltzes, jigs and two steps were
quickly adopted and played at dances. All these old tunes have been modified to produce a music style that is unique
and appropriately called Athabascan Old-Time Fiddling.”
Contemporary Native Music
Generations: An Alutiiq Music Collection
| 1) Ukut Skuunat |
2) Snowman |
| 3) Quyanaa Tailuci |
4) Kiak |
| 5) Ellpet |
6) Nakllek’gkiinga |
| 7) Anerneq Una |
8) Unuku |
| 9) Nuta’aq Quswasuuciq (Southern) |
10) Nuta’aq Quswasuuciq (Northern) |
| 11) Pisurtuq |
12) Nepainani Unuk |
| 13) Taiyukut Nuniamek |
14) Tang’rciqamci Caminguaqu |
| 15) Puqisqat |
16) Neresta |
| 17) Release Me Carl |
18) Quyanaa Tailuci |
| 19) Cauyaqa Gui Ikuk’gka |
20) Asisqamek Guangkuta |
| 21) Sledding |
22) Old Harbor Lights |
| 23) Big Creek Tamuuq |
24) Tuntut Taiyut |
| 25) Mary Introduces Ukut Skuunat |
26) The Woman Who Became a Bear |
| 27) Ungalaq |
|
Alutiiq Museum & Archaeological Repository, Kodiak, Alaska.
www.alutiiqmuseum.org
Drums of the North is the first strictly traditional Yup’ik album ever produced. It features Pamyua and high school
students from the Alaska Native Heritage Center in Anchorage. It won the 2007 Aboriginal Peoples Choice Music Award
for Best Inuit Traditional CD.
http://www.pamyua.com
Medicine Dream is an Intertribal First Nations group that performs contemporary Native American music.
http://www.medicinedream.com/
Books and Academic Publications
- Mischler, Craig Wallace. 1981. Gwich’in Athapaskan Music and Dance: An Ethnography and
- Ethnohistory, Dr. phil. Diss. University of Texas at Austin.
- _____. The Metal that sings, , , , ,
- Hinz, J., trans. The Gospel according to Mark in the Eskimo language of the Kuskokwim District,
- Alaska. Herrnhut, Germany: G. Winter, 1915.
- Hinz, John.Grammar and vocabulary of the Eskimo language, as spoken by the Kuskokwim and
- southwest coast Eskimos of Alaska.Bethlehem, Pa., Society for Propagating the Gospel, the
Moravian Church [1955, c1944].
- Eagle Museum. n.d. Early influences of the Violin in Eagle that led to the current Fiddler Tradition.
- Enrico, Johann and Wendy Bross Stuart. 1996. Northern Haida Songs. (Prince of Wales Island).
- Lincoln: Univ of Nebraska Press.
- Field, Edward. 1967. Songs and Stories of the Netsilik Eskimos (from the Rasmussen Expedition).
- Fletcher, Alice C. 1900. Indian Story and Song from North America.
- Houston, James. 1972. Songs of the Dream People. Indian and Eskimo Chants.
- Hufman, Don.1969. Article and bibliography in The Indian Historian. Vol. 2, No. 1. Institute of
- Alaska Native Arts. 1992. Athabascan Old-Time Fiddling Festival: Ten Years of Interior Music. Fairbanks: IANA.
- Johnston, Thomas. 1976. Eskimo Music by Region: A Comparative Circumpolar Study, diss.____.
- “Tlingit Dance, Music and Society” in Acta Ethnographica. Acad. Sci, Hung. 1986-1988, 34(1-4), 283-324.
- ____. and Tupou L. Pulu. n.d. Yup’ik Eskimo Songs. Materials Development Center, Rural
- Education, U. of Alaska. Koranda. (n.d) Alaskan Eskimo Songs and Stories. U of WA Press.
- Mishler, Craig. 1999. The Crooked Stovepipe: Athapaskan Fiddle Music and Square Dancing in
- Northeast Alaska and Northwest Canada. Chicago: U. of Illinois Press.
- ____, 1981. Gwich’in Athapaskan Music and Dance: An Ethnography and Ethnohistory, Dr. phil.
- Diss. University of Texas at Austin.
- Morrison, Dorothy. 1988. A Descriptive Analysis of Yakutat Tlingit Musical Style. MA Thesis,
- University of Alaska Fairbanks.
- Pearce, Tony Scott.1985. Musical Characteristics of Tanana Athabascan Dance Songs. MA
- Thesis, University of Alaska Fairbanks.
- Pulu, Tupou L. n.d. Koyukon Athabaskan Dance Songs. A joint project of the National Bilingual
- Materials Development Center, U. of Alaska, Anchorage, and the Alaska State Department of Education. Songs provided by Madeline Solomon, music transcribed by Thomas Johnston, song syllables transcribed by Eliza Jones, illustrations by Dinah Stephenson.
- Roberts, Helen, and D. Jennes. 1925. Report of the Canadian Arctic Expedition (Eskimo Songs).
- Roderick, Barry, ed. 1982. Guide to Alaska Folk Music and Oral History in the Archipelago.
- Collection. Barry Roderick and John Ingalls, compilers. Field recordings made for the Alaska Historical Library,
Juneau, and Rasmuson Library, University of Alaska Fairbanks. The majority of these songs came
about in the 1970s; the others are listed as traditional or Native.
- _____, editor and compiler. 1979. Panhandler Song Book: Folksongs of Southeast Alaska and the
- Yukon. Douglas, AK: Archipelago. Vol. I (Music by the people and for the people of the islands and
forests, mountains, glaciers, and seas of Southeast Alaska and the Yukon. Music and lyrics, stories
and tales, photographs and illustrations, rich as the mist in our mountains and the salmon in our seas.)
- _____, editor and compiler. 1981. Panhandler Song Book: Folksongs of Southeast Alaska and the
- North – Northwest, Douglas, AK: Archipelago, Vol. II.1979. Panhandler Song Book: Folksongs of Southeast Alaska and the Yukon. Douglas, AK: Archipelago. (Music by the people and for the people of the islands and forests, mountains, glaciers, and seas of Southeast Alaska and the Yukon. Music and lyrics, stories and tales, photographs and illustrations, rich as the mist in our mountains and the salmon in our seas.)
- _____ and John Ingalls, compilers. 1992. Folkways: FES 34031-FES 34033.Traditional and
- contemporary folk music performed by Alaskan artists, including native songs,
instrumental music and recitations, pamphlets include time lines, songs texts, historical photos and
bibliographies.
- Exploration and Discovery, 1786-1897
- Stampede and Settlement, 1898-1941
- Southeast Alaska Folk Tradition: Too Late for the Gold, Too Early for the Oil, 1942-1981
Williams, Maria del Pilar. 1996.
Alaska Native Music and Dance: The Spirit of Survival, diss.
Videos and Films about Music and Dance in Alaskan Native Cultures
Esther Shea: The Bear Stands Up. VHS, 29 minutes. A portrait of Tlingit elder Esther Shea of the
Tongass Bear Clan. She dedicated her life to teaching the language, songs, and values of Tlingit traditional life in Southeast Alaska. Woody Creek Productions. Presented by University of Alaska-Ketchikan Campus, 1994.
Drums in Winter. 1988. Leonard Kammerling and Sarah Elder. This feature-length documentary explores the traditional dance, music and spiritual world of the Yupik Eskimo people of Emmonak, a remote village at the mouth of the Yukon River on the Bering Sea coast.
Films from the Alaskan Eskimo series:
Films in the Netsilik Eskimo series: http://www.der.org/films/netsilik.html
Through These Eyes:
http://www.der.org/films/through-these-eyes.html
http://www.uaf.edu/museum/exhibit/galleries/mif-film.html
