First Nations Choral Festival

Daniel Ikpeama Author

11/26/2024 Added

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A series of new discoveries led DMA Choral Conducting student Mary Young to create the first ever program of choral music exclusively by Native American composers. Find out how her research led to a cross-curricular cultural event that deeply impacted people in Lincoln and beyond. Featuring: Mary Young, DMA - Choral Conducting Learn more about our programs at arts.unl.edu/music. Filmed by TODB Productions-Capture Creativity (https://todbproductions.com/).

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[00:00:00.000]I was researching Native American choral music for a project I was doing with the
[00:00:18.600]Institute for Composer Diversity. I did a hundred hours of research with them a
[00:00:22.320]couple of summers ago and really got into Native American music. Also some
[00:00:26.280]work that I did with the New York Choral Consortium as their diversity and action
[00:00:29.400]intern and discovered the lack of music in the choral canon that's either
[00:00:34.800]written by Native Americans or inspired by Native Americans with traceable
[00:00:38.340]verifiable source material. So I became very inspired to commission living
[00:00:44.940]Native American composers. I applied for a grant at the University of Nebraska
[00:00:55.980]Lincoln to commission this artist and I got the grant
[00:00:58.800]once I got it it then blossomed into this idea of well we should turn the
[00:01:02.760]premiere into something special because in all the years of all the concert
[00:01:06.120]programs I went back and looked through at UNL I couldn't find a single Native
[00:01:09.980]American piece on a program let alone a concert. It grew into well I should
[00:01:14.340]invite this high school choir I should invite this church choir so it became a
[00:01:17.620]bigger a bigger event as time went on. So I started with my advisor my professor
[00:01:22.560]Dr. Pete Eklund at the University and he suggested that I begin with my existing
[00:01:26.880]contacts in the Lincoln area at local high schools and churches and thankfully
[00:01:31.080]we have a really tight-knit musical community here in Lincoln so it was easy
[00:01:35.100]to reach out to friends and say hey I'm doing this cool thing is your is your
[00:01:38.340]church choir interested is your high school choir interested. Anybody who
[00:01:42.940]knows Mary knows that kind of the ambition that resides within Four
[00:01:49.440]Beautiful Things is sort of unending you know sort of limitless. It feels like the
[00:01:56.620]exact type of project that a doctoral student and a major university program
[00:02:05.800]needs to be pursuing. People have such a hunger for this and such a curiosity too
[00:02:10.120]about Native American music and how it could be presented in the choral format
[00:02:13.840]because it's not something we're used to seeing. People were immediately on board
[00:02:16.840]it was really exciting. I think Mary did an amazing job of brainstorming with
[00:02:22.940]some important people in this realm.
[00:02:26.360]Whether it was locally, statewide, regionally, or even nationally, Mary just
[00:02:32.300]took this and ran with it and it was absolutely delightful to see it all come together.
[00:02:36.680]I worked with my wonderful friend Logan at Lincoln North Star and my
[00:02:39.920]friend Hunter at Standing Bear High School which just opened this year.
[00:02:44.420]We connected I think around Allstate weekend which should have been in November, got
[00:02:48.400]this on the calendar, really excited about the opportunity to collaborate
[00:02:51.640]with some other programs and also do something that is so close to kind of
[00:02:56.100]our goal and our mission as a school. That was kind of what really drew me and
[00:03:00.460]us to the project. Our school has been pretty closely aligned with like the
[00:03:03.980]Ponca tribe specifically and some of the Native American leaders in the community
[00:03:08.640]and so it felt like this the mission of the festival really aligned with what we
[00:03:14.320]were trying to do as a school. So when I went and worked with these choirs at the
[00:03:17.320]high schools I love telling them the history behind it talking about the
[00:03:20.040]Cherokee language and there was even one of the high schoolers that came up to me
[00:03:23.280]and she said I'm Cherokee I have never
[00:03:25.840]known any words in my language I don't speak any Cherokee my family's so
[00:03:29.920]excited we've never heard of anyone singing in Cherokee and we can't wait
[00:03:33.500]for this. All of the administration at Standing Bear were so excited because
[00:03:37.300]they've built this school here to honor Standing Bear and they've never done
[00:03:41.200]native music before so it served as sort of a gateway to open that world for them.
[00:03:44.960]Her work brought new music to my plate and we
[00:03:51.040]performed pretty much the entire year a piece by a Lakota
[00:03:55.580]composer that I was thrilled and and and the choir was thrilled we sang it
[00:04:00.740]for our statewide Nebraska music educators conference in November and it
[00:04:05.000]was a it was a big hit. Working with the choirs was so rewarding because I got to
[00:04:09.320]really collaborate and trust my colleagues. Logan's choir did a piece by
[00:04:13.560]James Green who's a Cherokee composer and he had just composed a piece about a
[00:04:18.500]river in North Carolina the Oconaluftee River
[00:04:21.300]and then Hunter's choir at Standing Bear they got to do a piece that's based on
[00:04:25.320]the Wayfaring Stranger melody to Cherokee lyrics. So we performed a piece
[00:04:29.700]called North Wind was the translation and it was based on Poor Wayfaring
[00:04:34.380]Stranger that initial tune and so Mary had sent us a list of potential pieces
[00:04:39.360]and as I kind of went through there that one jumped out at me both for its
[00:04:43.080]connection with the Trail of Tears and the Cherokee Nation and the Cherokee
[00:04:48.080]Youth Choir the National Youth Choir has a tradition of performing this piece so
[00:04:52.700]those kind of connections jumped out at me. We have a
[00:04:55.060]younger group this year and so I was looking for something that could be
[00:04:59.060]accessible melodically and that we could hopefully do really successfully. We had
[00:05:05.080]one practice session with Mary she came out here and introduced the other piece
[00:05:08.740]the group piece and then we yeah just went together for the concert. So I got
[00:05:13.180]to do the fun part of coming in to polish when my colleagues had done such
[00:05:16.860]a really good job introducing the pieces. I was really proud of how we
[00:05:20.180]weaved storytelling into the concert so it was beyond the scope of just a
[00:05:24.800]Western park and bark choral concert. It really came alive. I believe that any
[00:05:29.960]time you can kind of pull back the curtain a little bit and tell the
[00:05:33.140]students and invite them into why the piece is interesting and why that music
[00:05:38.840]is cool and why the composer has made some of those choices, that kind of
[00:05:43.280]context I think is a natural kind of, I don't know, it naturally buffers the
[00:05:48.920]whole experience. The experience of having a composer in on the
[00:05:54.540]learning process was very valuable for students to see. To see it go through a
[00:06:00.840]transformation where people start to sing and they start to hear this music
[00:06:06.720]and they start to realize not only is it good music but it means something. I
[00:06:13.560]could not have been more pleased how it all came together as well. So what made
[00:06:18.300]it come alive for me was the day before the festival when my composer friend Dr.
[00:06:23.140]William Linthicum Blackhorse
[00:06:24.280]got into town. Just to see the looks on the students faces when the composer was
[00:06:28.280]in the room and to hear the difference in the students singing and on their
[00:06:31.760]faces I knew that the next day our festival was gonna be an enormous
[00:06:36.780]success just having him there. Having him present and participate in the final
[00:06:41.820]concert I think was magic.
[00:06:43.680]The church that hosted us, St. Paul United Methodist, they have a wonderful choir, and
[00:06:47.420]I picked a piece especially for them because I knew their voices, and there was a certain
[00:06:50.800]soloist that I was picking music for.
[00:06:52.440]The church choirs were very, very excited to be part of this festival.
[00:06:56.020]It's not often they get to do things other than, like, a sacred anthem every week, and
[00:07:00.820]so it was really, really exciting to work with these churches, and a lot of the members
[00:07:03.980]from the church choirs had approached me afterwards and said, this is so special to get to do
[00:07:07.680]something a little bit out of the box and educational, and it gave them ideas for further
[00:07:12.080]collaborations.
[00:07:12.940]It wasn't strictly academic, it wasn't strictly church, it was a blending of everything and
[00:07:16.820]a celebration of culture.
[00:07:17.820]I also crossed paths with Judy Gashkabash, she's the executive director of Indian Affairs
[00:07:23.480]for the state of Nebraska.
[00:07:24.700]So not only did I get to work with church choirs and high school choirs and all the
[00:07:29.500]university choirs that we have at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, but also opened it up
[00:07:33.980]at the suggestion of Judy Gashkabash to other artists in the area.
[00:07:37.580]One of them, Sarah Rowe, ended up getting back to me and being very excited about the
[00:07:41.140]event.
[00:07:41.360]She's of the Ponca tribe.
[00:07:42.460]And she's based out of Omaha, Nebraska.
[00:07:44.120]I was really excited to be a part of this festival that's music and sound centered.
[00:07:49.840]So usually I start with the art first, and then the sound is an added layer.
[00:07:54.140]So it was interesting to kind of turn the tables in that way and respond to the sound.
[00:07:59.560]She curated a list of art based upon listening to all of the music for the festival that
[00:08:05.020]would go with each piece.
[00:08:06.160]And I thought that was a really special, beautiful touch.
[00:08:08.080]It was an interesting meditation, listening to each piece.
[00:08:11.980]And thinking about works that I've made as a painter that would make sense.
[00:08:19.140]So we were able to create a program where we alternated between a piece of music, then
[00:08:23.680]you would have a video on the screen of a composer talking about a piece, or art was
[00:08:27.820]on the screen.
[00:08:28.400]Another way we were able to incorporate non-musical art into the program was by collaborating
[00:08:33.360]with Aaliyah American Horse.
[00:08:34.660]She is the Youth Poet Laureate for the Midwest.
[00:08:36.680]And we discovered that she is based in Nebraska as well, invited her to the event.
[00:08:41.740]And we were able to create a program where we alternated between a piece of music, then
[00:08:41.960]She was so excited to collaborate with us, and she presented some of her poetry between
[00:08:46.040]the pieces of music.
[00:08:47.060]All of these connections came together, and these people had never heard Native American
[00:08:52.300]music, some of this, on the stage before.
[00:08:54.900]And it was so special and important to them to hear that.
[00:08:57.180]It was special to me the night of the festival, being the one who had picked the music, the
[00:09:01.700]one who had spent a couple years researching all the music.
[00:09:03.820]I sort of knew what to expect.
[00:09:05.620]I knew what was coming.
[00:09:06.500]But the other people didn't.
[00:09:08.500]The other choirs coming in had only heard their piece.
[00:09:11.940]They hadn't heard the other choirs, and they weren't aware of the broader scope of it all
[00:09:14.980]and the bigger story that we were telling.
[00:09:16.320]It was special to see on their faces as they got their program, their program notes, and
[00:09:20.160]went to their places.
[00:09:20.940]I had structured the concert, of course, to where it was a big climax, to where it told
[00:09:25.520]a bigger story.
[00:09:26.220]And as we got closer to that climax, I could feel in the room people's connection with
[00:09:31.180]the music.
[00:09:31.580]That was so rewarding and special to me, to get to see people experience what I had been
[00:09:36.840]working on for years for the first time.
[00:09:38.800]People were making those connections.
[00:09:40.140]That was really rewarding for me to see.
[00:09:42.080]The boldness of bringing in the other art forms, the seeing a broad-based support because
[00:09:48.560]so many from so many corners were involved, and then having that experience of the composition
[00:09:55.640]slash performance process was, I think, valuable for our students.
[00:09:59.940]It is so different.
[00:10:00.960]We get used to singing, yeah, in Italian or German or whatever it may be, and so I think
[00:10:05.480]I come, and probably the students come, with certain preconceived ideas of how learning
[00:10:10.420]a new language for singing can be.
[00:10:11.900]I think their appreciation for our piece and Native American music in general really changed
[00:10:18.520]after the concert, so seeing how important it was to those people that were there, I
[00:10:23.360]think that is what kind of helped them appreciate it and enjoy it even more.
[00:10:26.600]One of the coolest aspects of it that's definitely hyper-specific to us is they spoke at the
[00:10:32.300]festival about Chief Standing Bear and some different representatives of different nations
[00:10:36.200]talked about him, and I think for the kids it was maybe one of the first times where
[00:10:41.880]this name that they've heard, or this name that's on their jerseys or their t-shirts,
[00:10:49.500]it had a little bit more realness to it.
[00:10:51.640]The people who attended the concert, whether they were administration or our parents or
[00:10:56.140]families of the students, I think were really blown away both by the ability of the different
[00:11:01.000]groups, but the passion behind all of this.
[00:11:08.700]This has gotten a lot of conversations started, and people are wanting to
[00:11:11.860]lift up Native stories, and I'm so excited to see how this is going to take a different
[00:11:16.100]life.
[00:11:17.100]I think this festival has helped forge deeper connections amongst Indigenous artists.
[00:11:24.680]Many of us Indigenous people don't have a sense of community.
[00:11:29.320]Being able to work with other Indigenous artists, I think, is really important to help build
[00:11:34.800]this sense of community and work together to tell our stories, which are often ignored.
[00:11:41.840]When I read my own writings, sometimes I feel like it's the unhinged ramblings of someone
[00:11:46.160]who's oddly obsessed with a super niche topic.
[00:11:48.620]What I was so surprised about was the wildfire that caught on, and I was shocked to discover
[00:11:54.920]other people are fired up about this too.
[00:11:57.020]I think it's exciting that we get to travel and go to places musically that no one has
[00:12:04.180]gone before.
[00:12:05.180]I think everybody, not only the performers, but the audience was very excited to hear
[00:12:10.560]beautiful sounds.
[00:12:11.820]Come together on that final concert.
[00:12:13.740]I think when you have those experiences it makes you kind of hungry for more, so you
[00:12:17.060]want to be able to see more choirs.
[00:12:19.720]You want to be exposed to new cultures.
[00:12:22.660]So I think that was probably some of the biggest takeaways, both for our kids and for the community.
[00:12:26.160]I'm constantly fascinated with finding new ways to collaborate.
[00:12:31.060]This festival, I think, being more connected with musicians will expand the scope of what
[00:12:39.880]I can imagine.
[00:12:41.800]And my own creative practice.
[00:12:44.940]For me, the most exciting thing post-festival is seeing all the connections that were made
[00:12:49.260]and continue to be made.
[00:12:50.700]From the university students who had never heard a piece in a native language, to the
[00:12:54.540]artists who knew about native visual art but had never heard of native choral art.
[00:12:58.300]And all these people are now connected with each other, and they get to collaborate in
[00:13:01.820]the future.
[00:13:02.820]Thank you.
[00:13:24.900]Thank you.

First Nations Choral Festival

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First Nations Choral Festival

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