Blackfoot music is the
musicMusic is an art form whose medium is sound. Common elements of music are pitch , rhythm , dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture...
of the
BlackfootThe Blackfoot Confederacy or Niitsítapi is the collective name of three First Nations in Alberta and one Native American tribe in Montana....
tribes (best translated in the
Blackfoot languageThe Piegan Blackfeet are a tribe of Native Americans based in Montana. Many members of the tribe currently live as part of the Blackfeet Nation in northwestern Montana, with population centered in Browning...
as
nitsínixki - "I sing", from
nínixksini - "song").
SingingSinging is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice, and augments regular speech by the use of both tonality and rhythm. A person who sings is called a singer or vocalist...
predominates and was
accompaniedIn music, accompaniment is the art of playing along with a soloist or ensemble, often known as the lead, in a supporting manner as well as the music thus played...
only by percussion. (Nettl, 1989)
Bruno Nettl (1989, p. 162-163) proposes that Blackfoot music is an "emblem of the heroic and the difficult in Blackfoot life," with performance practices that strongly distinguish music from the rest of life. Singing is strongly distinguished from speech and many songs contain no words, and those with texts often describe important parts of myths in a succinct manner. Music is associated closely with
warWar is a reciprocated, armed conflict, between two or more non-congruous entities, aimed at reorganising a subjectively designed, geo-politically desired result...
fare and most singing is done by men and much by community leaders. "The acquisition of songs as associated with difficult feats--learned in visions brought about through self-denial and torture, required to be learned quickly, sung with the expenditure of great energy, sung in a difficult vocal style--all of this puts songs in the category of the heroic and the difficult."
Instrumentation
Blackfoot music is primarily vocal, using few
instrumentA musical instrument is an object constructed or used for the purpose of making the sounds of music. In principle, anything that produces sound can serve as a musical instrument. The history of musical instruments dates back to the beginnings of human culture...
s (called
ninixkiátsis, derived from the word for song and associated primarily with
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
an-American instruments), only
percussionA percussion instrument is any object which produces a sound by being hit with an implement, shaken, rubbed, scraped, or by any other action which sets the object into vibration...
and voice, and few words. By far the most important percussion instruments are
drumThe drum is a member of the percussion group of music instruments, technically classified as a membranophone.. Drums consist of at least one membrane, called a drumhead or drum skin, that is stretched over a shell and struck, either directly with parts of a player's body, or with some sort of...
s (
istókimatsis), with
rattleRattle may mean:* Rattle * RATTLE magazine, an American poetry journal* Bird-scaring rattle, a Slovene device used to drive birds off vineyards and a folk instrument* Ratchet , a percussion instrument* Death rattle...
s (
auaná) and
bellA bell is a simple sound-making device. The bell is a percussion instrument and an idiophone. Its form is usually a hollow, cup-shaped object, which resonates upon being struck...
s often being associated with the objects, such as sticks or dancers legs, they are attached to rather than as instruments of their own. (Nettl 1989)
Singing
Singing consists mostly of
vocableIn speech, a vocable is an utterance, term, or word that is capable of being spoken and recognized. A non-lexical vocable is used without semantic role or meaning, while structure of vocables is often considered apart from any meaning...
s, though recordings and reports from the early 1900s and prior indicate there were a great deal more
lyricsLyrics are a set of words that make up a song. The writer of lyrics is a lyricist or lyrist. The meaning of lyrics can either be explicit or implicit. Some lyrics are abstract, almost unintelligible, and, in such cases, their explication emphasizes form, articulation, meter, and symmetry of...
or vocal texts. Blackfoot people see the profusion of words in European American music and
African American musicAfrican-American music is an umbrella term given to a range of music and musical genres emerging from or influenced by the culture of African Americans, who have long constituted a large ethnic minority of the population of the United States...
as lessening the importance and meaning of both words and music; and the same for the manner of listening to such music, that is, for
entertainmentAn entertainment is any activity which provides a diversion or permits people to amuse themselves in their leisure time.Entertainment is typically passive - as in watching opera or a movie. Activities which involve participating in games or sports are more often considered to be recreation...
or enjoyment, often while doing other things: if someone needed to say so many words, why didn't they just talk (p.69). Blackfoot music is not based on instruments or texts, and singing is not supposed to sound like talking (or imitate any other sound). Typically, songs which contain texts are short and not repetitive, such as: "It's a bad thing to be an old man," (Nettl, 1989, p.73, 1951 recording of a Crazy Dog Society song) or the relatively lengthy, "Yonder woman, you must take me. I am powerful. Yonder woman, you must take me, you must hear me. Where I sit is powerful." (Nettl, 1989, p.73, Wissler and Duvall 1909:85 sung by a rock to a woman in the buffalo-rock myth). Often when the text takes up most of the melody with fewer vocables the melodies are short. The vocables used, as in Plains Indian singing, are the
consonantIn articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the upper vocal tract, the upper vocal tract being defined as that part of the vocal tract that lies above the larynx...
s
h,
y,
w, and
vowelIn phonetics, a vowel is a sound in spoken language, such as English ah! or oh! , pronounced with an open vocal tract so that there is no build-up of air pressure at any point above the glottis. This contrasts with consonants, such as English sh! , where there is a constriction or closure at some...
s. They avoid
n,
c (
ts) and other consonants.
i and
e tend slightly to be higher in
pitchPitch represents the perceived fundamental frequency of a sound. It is one of the three major auditory attributes of sounds along with loudness and timbre. When the actual fundamental frequency can be precisely determined through physical measurement, it may differ from the perceived pitch because...
,
a,
o, and
u lower (p.71). (Nettl, 1989)
Solo singing may have been more prominent, or the norm, in the past, but group singing has increased in prominence, with singing/drumming groups called "drums". Vocal blending is not required in ensemble singing. The leader may begin the head
motiveIn music, a motif or motive is a short musical idea, a salient recurring figure, musical fragment or succession of notes that has some special importance in or is characteristic of a composition...
or
phraseA musical phrase is a unit of musical meter that has a complete musical sense of its own, built from figures, motifs, and cells and combining to form melodies, periods and larger sections. or the length in which a singer or instrumentalist can play in one breath.The term, like sentence, verse etc...
of a song, and then be repeated or "raised" by another singer, possibly the second singer (p.149). In pan-Indian powwow terminology,
stanzaIn poetry, a stanza is a unit within a larger poem. In modern poetry, the term is often equivalent with strophe; in popular vocal music, a stanza is typically referred to as a "verse"...
s to a song are often called "push-ups" (p.150). (Nettl, 1989)
Vocal style
The vocal style is similar to other Plains Indians with: "high-pitched beginnings, pulsations, vocal narrowness. [and] nasality." (p.67) "Pulsations on longer tones, the audible effects of tension, nasality, substantial
raspA rasp is a tool used for shaping wood or other material. It consists of a point or the tip, then a long steel bar or the belly, then the heel or bottom, then the tang. The tang is joined to a handle, usually made of plastic or wood. The bar has had sharp teeth cut into it...
, and some ornamentation are characteristic." (p. 43) Though this may have become "exaggerated" through influence from Plains Indian music and pan-Indian music, Blackfoot singing is "more intense and uses a higher
tessituraIn music, the term tessitura generally describes the most musically acceptable and comfortable range for a given singer or, less frequently, musical instrument; the range in which a given type of voice presents its best-sounding texture or timbre...
," than most Plains Indian music. From comparison of recordings one would agree with older consultants in the latter 1900s: "These younger fellows, they sing higher and louder than we used to." (pg.67)
ExperimentationExperimental music refers, in the English-language literature, to a compositional tradition which arose in the mid-twentieth century, particularly in North America, and whose most famous and influential exponent was John Cage...
with European influenced instrumentation and
harmonyIn music, harmony is the use of simultaneous pitches, or chords. The study of harmony involves chords and their construction and chord progressions and the principles of connection that govern them. Harmony is often said to refer to the "vertical" aspect of music, as distinguished from melodic...
happen but are rare, and the vocal style is the element least tampered with it being considered essential to "sound like Indian songs" (p.68). Though the European influenced concept of meter may be inapplicable to Blackfoot music as it is characterized by the relationships between phrases usually of irregular length, the beat level generally equals the rate at which vocal pulsations occur (p.44). (Nettl, 1989)
Drumming
Singing without drums is extremely rare and considered inappropriate (Nettl, 1989). The drum accompaniment to songs is
rhythmRhythm is the variation of the length and accentuation of a series of sounds or other events.-Rhythm in linguistics:...
ically independent to the singing but in perfect unison, "slightly off the beat", and "often related roughly by the proportion of 2:3," to the vocal pulse or beat level (though see Pantaleoni, 1987). Another change in Blackfoot music is increased relatedness of the drum part to the song now than in the past. Often drumming over repeated sections that comprise a song begins with players softly striking the rim of the bass drum. The
tempoIn musical terminology, tempo is the speed or pace of a given piece. It is a crucial element of composition, as it can affect the mood and difficulty of a piece.-Measuring tempo:...
increases as the drumming moves further to the center of the drum skin. At some point "hard beats", loud strokes off the rhythm by an individual, sometimes the leader, and beats may be omitted. Drumming may pause for a phrase or two in the last stanza of the last repetition and finish loudly. When playing the stick game, players drum upon a plank, and the drumming is more likely to coincide with vocal beats, but less accurate unison playing. Rattles are no longer used. (Nettl, 1989, p.157)
Drumming has increased in prominence since 1900, now being virtually required, possibly because of the influence of pan-tribal culture, the decreased use of rattles and other percussion, or the decrease in frequency of songs texts. The use of the term "drumming" for musician/singer also increased between the 1960s and the 1980s. (Nettl, 1989)
Song composition
Traditionally, songs are considered to be given, completed, to individual Blackfoot people in
visionsA hallucination, in the broadest sense, is a perception in the absence of a stimulus. In a stricter sense, hallucinations are defined as perceptions in a conscious and awake state in the absence of external stimuli which have qualities of real perception, in that they are vivid, substantial, and...
or
dreamDreams are a succession of images, thoughts, or emotions passing through the mind during sleep. The content and purpose of dreams are not fully understood, though they have been a topic of speculation and interest throughout recorded history. The scientific study of dreams is known as...
s. Though it is now accepted that music, especially white music, may be composed in the European influenced sense, the traditional view still greatly affects how songs and their creation or origin are considered. Songs are considered somewhat like objects, in that they may be created of components, but once finished become a unity. They may also be "given" or even sold. Some songs belong to everyone, some songs to just one person but may be sung by others, and some songs individuals save until times of great need. Two songs which may be aurally identical may considered different songs if they have different origins, i.e., came from different visions. (Nettl, 1989)
Most songs, except gambling songs which simply repeat "litany-like" one or two phrases, are characterized by an "incomplete repetition" formal pattern, "many of them can ultimately be reduced to a binary form in which the section is a
variationIn music, variation is a formal technique where material is altered during repetition: reiteration with changes. The changes may involve harmony, melody, counterpoint, rhythm, timbre or orchestration.-Variation form:...
and/or reduction of the first." (p.43) However, there was more formal variation in the past (p.100). Songs sung with medicine basket openings and gamblings songs often use
isometricThe term isometric comes from the Greek for "having equal measurement".isometric may mean:* Isometric projection , a method for the visual representation of three-dimensional objects in two dimensions; a form of orthographic projection, or more specifically, an axonometric projection.* Isometry and...
and
isorhythmIsorhythm is a musical technique that arranges a fixed pattern of pitches with a repeating rhythmic pattern.-Detail:...
ic rhythmic structures or lesser
noteIn music, the term note has two primary meanings:#a sign used in musical notation to represent the relative duration and pitch of a sound;#a pitched sound itself....
-
lengthDuration is an amount of time or a particular time interval. In sounds and music, aduration is a property of a tone that becomes one of the bases of rhythm.-Sound and music:A tone may be sustained for varying lengths of time...
values (p.44). Typically songs begin in
falsettoThe term falsetto refers to the vocal register occupying the frequency range just above the modal voice register and overlapping with it by approximately one octave. It is produced by the vibration of the ligamentous edges of the vocal cords, in whole or in part...
before singers move to their
head voiceHead voice is a term used within vocal music. The use of this term varies widely within vocal pedagogical circles and there is currently no one consistent opinion among vocal music professionals in regards to this term...
s. Octave equivalence appears to be used, as
transpositionIn music transposition refers to the process of moving a collection of notes up or down in pitch by a constant interval. For example, one might transpose an entire piece of music into another key. Similarly, one might transpose a tone row or an unordered collection of pitches such as a chord so...
down by an
octaveIn music, an octave , is the interval between one musical pitch and another with half or double its frequency. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon which has been referred to as the "basic miracle of music," the use of which is "common in most musical systems." It may be derived from the...
of subsequent repetitions of a section is common, though may also occur down a
perfect fourthThe perfect fourth is a musical interval which spans four scale degrees. It consists of the note and the note five semitones above it on the musical scale. For example, the interval between a C and the next F above it is a perfect fourth; similarly the interval between a G and the next C above...
or
perfect fifthThe perfect fifth is the musical interval between a note and the note seven semitones above it on the musical scale. For example, the note G lies a perfect fifth above C; D is a perfect fifth above G, C is a perfect fifth above F...
(p.43). Songs begin with a "head motif" repeated by the second singer and then used to "generate" the rest of the song in ways which are fairly predictable to Blackfoot listeners, which facilitates accomplishing the ideal of learning songs in one hearing (p.100-101).
Genres and repertoire
Children do not have their own
songChildren's music is used here to refer to music composed and performed for children by adults. In European influenced contexts this means music, usually songs, written specifically for a juvenile audience. The composers are usually adults. Children's music has historically held both entertainment...
or game song repertoire, except for Mice Songs associated with one game (p.85), and songs usually called
lullabiesA lullaby is a soothing song, usually sung to children before they go to sleep, with the intention of speeding that process. As a result they are often simple and repetitive...
sung to them by their mothers. Women used to have their own small repertoire of lullabies,
lamentA lament or lamentation is a song, poem, or piece of music expressing grief, regret, or mourning.-History:Many of the oldest and most lasting poems in human history have been laments. Laments are present in both the Iliad and the Odyssey, and laments continued to be sung in elegiacs accompanied by...
s, and other songs, but these have been largely lost.
Two-SpiritTwo-Spirit people, or berdache was a term created in 1990 in anthropological literature, to describe Native Americans who fulfill one of many mixed gender roles found traditionally among many Native Americans and Canadian First Nations indigenous groups...
"manly-hearted women" (Lewis, 1941) who act in much of the social roles of men, were in the past also willing to sing alone and use a men's singing style. (Nettl, 1989, p.84, 125).
Scales and intervals
Musical scaleIn music, a scale is a group of musical notes collected in ascending and descending order, that provides material for or is used to conveniently represent part or all of a musical work including melody and/or harmony...
s tend to be fairly equally spaced
tetratonicIn music, a scale is a group of musical notes collected in ascending and descending order, that provides material for or is used to conveniently represent part or all of a musical work including melody and/or harmony...
,
pentatonicA pentatonic scale is a musical scale with five pitches per octave in contrast to a heptatonic scale such as the major scale. Pentatonic scales are very common and are found all over the world, including Celtic folk music, Hungarian folk music, West African music, African-American spirituals,...
, or rarely hexatonic or heptatonic scales with occasional
major secondA major second , also called a whole step or a whole tone, is a musical interval that occurs between the first and second degrees of a major scale, the tonic and the supertonic. The major second is abbreviated as M2; its inversion is the minor seventh...
s and rare minor seconds. (Nettl, 1989, p. 43)
Musical thought
The basic musical unit in Blackfoot music is the
songA song is a metrical composition intended or adapted for singing, especially one in rhymed stanzas; a lyric; a ballad....
, and
musicianA musician is a person who performs or writes music. Musicians can be classified by their roles in creating or performing music:* An instrumentalist plays a musical instrument.* A singer uses his or her voice as an instrument....
s, people who sing and drum, are called singers or
drummerA drummer is a person who plays drums, particularly a drum kit , marching percussion or hand drums. The term percussionist applies to a musician performing on any percussion instrument, but usually refers to one who plays classical or Latin percussion. Most bands for Rock, Pop, Jazz, R&B etc...
s with both words being equivalent and referring to both activities (p.49). Women, though increasingly equal participants, are not called
singers or
drummers and it is considered somewhat inappropriate for women to sing loudly or alone.
Páskani - "dance" or "ceremony" - often implicitly includes music and is often applied to ceremonies with little dancing and much singing. (Nettl, 1989)
Blackfoot musical thought is also more
enumerativeIn mathematics and theoretical computer science, the broadest and most abstract definition of an enumeration of a set is an exact listing of all of its elements . The restrictions imposed on the type of list used depend on the branch of mathematics and the context in which one is working...
than European influenced musical thought which tends to be more hierarchical. Songs are differentiated primarily by use: in ceremonies, often associated with specific objects (especially in
medicine bundleA medicine bundle is a wrapped package used by Native Americans for religious purposes. A package of this type can also be referred to as a medicine bag. Medicine bundles are usually employed as a ritual aid in Shamanistic religions...
s), concepts,
danceDance is a sport and art form that generally refers to movement of the body, usually rhythmic and to music, used as a form of expression, social interaction or presented in a spiritual or performance setting....
s, or actions, or during gambling (hand game), or other uses. Songs are differentiated secondarily by association with a person, and thirdly and less commonly by association with a story or event. There are no types of music which are considered more or less music or
musicalHow to define music has long been the subject of debate; philosophers, musicians, and, more recently, various social and natural scientists have argued about what constitutes music. The definition has varied through history, in different regions, and within societies. Definitions vary as music,...
, such as in Iranian musical thought. (Nettl, 1989)
Music, singing, is not thought to be like speech, or any other sound at all. There are no spoken introductions or conclusions and no "intermediary forms" between speech and singing (pg.50).
Rehearsing happens increasingly, likely because of the influence of European influenced concepts of performance, song origin or composition, and a change in the purpose of music: from communication with the supernatural to communication with other humans.
Ethnography
As the Blackfoot are one of the most
studied American Indian groupsNative American Studies is an interdisciplinary academic field that examines the history, culture, politics, issues and contemporary experience of Native peoples in North America...
there are many collections of Blackfoot music, the largest being at the Archives of Traditional Music at
Indiana UniversityIndiana University, founded in 1820 as the Indiana State Seminary and renamed the Indiana College in 1846, is a nine-campus university system in the state of Indiana...
. Historical comparisons may be made as the earliest recordings of Blackfoot music were done on wax cylinders. The first recordings, by
George Bird GrinnellGeorge Bird Grinnell was an American anthropologist, historian, naturalist, and writer. Grinnell was born in Brooklyn, New York, and graduated from Yale University with a B.A. in 1870 and a Ph.D. in 1880. Originally specializing in zoology, he became a prominent early conservationist and student...
in 1897, are of James White Calf or others singing around forty songs in or around the Blackfoot Nation. The second set of recording, by Clark Wissler in 1903 and 1904 contains 146 cylinders, part of his larger studies and the third, by J.K. Dixon of the Wanamaker Expedition No. 2 in 1909, includes several songs sung mostly by Chief Bull at the Crow Agency. The next big collection, by Jane Richardson Hanks accompanied by husband Lucien Hanks in 1938, was recorded in
Gleichen, AlbertaGleichen, Alberta is a town in rural southeast Alberta, Canada, located adjacent to the Siksika NationDuring the formation of the province the town was big enough to have its own seat in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta see Gleichen provincial electoral district.During its early days Gleichen...
among the
Canadian BlackootThe Siksika Nation is a First Nation in southern Alberta, Canada. The name Siksiká comes from the Blackfoot words sik and iká , with a connector s between the two words. The plural form of Siksiká is Siksikáwa. The Siksikáwa are the northernmost of the Niitsítapi...
and featured Spumiapi ("White-Headed Chief"). After the invention of the tape recorder thousands of songs where recorded by Indians, ethnomusicologists, hobbyists and students, and record companies. (Nettl 1973)
Though these recordings are countless there are chronological gaps (1910-1950), complex music and culture changed rapidly, and the various groups are treated unevenly. Additionally there are few studies of the musical culture (most recordings being made as part of ethnographic studies), mostly by
Bruno NettlBruno Nettl is an active ethnomusicologist and musicologist.Bruno Nettl was born in Czechoslovakia in 1930, moved to United States in 1939, studied at Indiana University and the University of Michigan, and has taught since 1964 at the University of Illinois, where he is Professor Emeritus of...
. (ibid)
Public interest in Blackfoot music is indicated by the release of two records (17611 and 17635), recorded unexplainably in New York in 1914. Beginning in the 1950s professional singing groups where formed. (ibid)
Current traditional musical groups
- Black Lodge Singers
The Black Lodge Singers of White Swan, Washington are a Native American drum group led by Kenny Scabby Robe, of the Blackfeet Nation. The Black Lodge Singers are largely drawn from his twelve sons. They have released twenty albums for Canyon Records including two albums of pow wow songs for...
- Heart Butte Singers
- Young Grey Horse Society
- Two Medicine Lake Singers
Source
- Nettl, Bruno (1973). Liner notes to An Historical Album of Blackfeet Indian Music. Smithsonian Folkways Recordings: FE 34001.
- Nettl, Bruno (1989). Blackfoot Musical Thought: Comparative Perspectives. Ohio: The Kent State University Press. ISBN 0-87338-370-2.
Further listening
- An Historical Album of Blackfeet Indian Musie. Smithsonian Folkways Recordings: FE 34001.