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• 1 media/Image_Horizontal People 2.png 2022-06-02T21:56:15+00:00 Centering Indigenous Voices: Raven Chacon 24 A Look into Journey of the Horizontal People plain 2022-06-07T01:19:18+00:00 Raven Chacon (Dinè) is a multidisciplinary experimental artist. He primarily operates in the fields of noise performance, composition, and art installation. Raven was born in Fort Defiance, Navajo Nation, Arizona and now resides in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Raven’s artistic versatility and strikingly innovative composition style have garnered international attention. He has earned several awards including, most notably, the American Academy in Berlin Prize and the Pulitzer Prize for Music.
  
  Raven’s current body of work represents quite a wide variety of styles, narratives, and artistic approaches. From meticulously notated string quartet pieces to scores composed for an octet of rifles, Raven constantly innovates upon multidisciplinary artmaking. In a curatorial essay by Anthony Huberman for the Wattis Institute, Raven discussed feeling the burden of the tokenization of his Dinè identity. There is a lingering expectation that he must demonstrate the influence of his own Indigeneity within his compositions. As Huberman says, “All those well-intentioned white people, myself included, want to feel like we are listening to, making space for, and empowering others, after all, and certain boxes need to be checked in order for that to count” (Huberman n.d.)  False characterizations and expectations are born out of the continuous centering of one’s own whiteness. This results in the assumption that the subject of Raven’s artmaking must be his own Indigeneity which neglects any narrative, intricacy, or nuance within his work. Conversely, Raven “uses his own Indigeneity only as a lens—it is not the subject of his work but it reflects, colors, and filters how he sees the world”(Huberman). 
  

  Tinged with reflections and narratives of Raven’s Indigeneity, his string quartet, Journey of the Horizontal People, exemplifies community: the absence, search for, and subsequent development of it. Journey of the Horizontal People was commissioned by the Kronos String Quartet in 2016 for their 50 for the Future series. Raven envisioned Journey as a sort of “future creation story telling of a group of people traveling from west to east, across the written page, contrary to the movement of the sun, but involuntarily and unconsciously allegiant to the trappings of time” (Chacon 2016).  
  
  Movement is a main theme of Journey and it manifests itself in several ways. Raven talks about designing Journey, so that each player will inevitably lose their place at some point in the piece.  Circular bowings, scratch tones, and double stop ‘seagulls’ are a few examples of how movement is sonically realized. Circular bowings indicate clockwise or counter-clockwise bowing patterns which may vary in speed, volume, or bow placement. Scratch tones indicate a build up of pressure or weight in the bow, so that one may achieve an unpitched, scratching sound.
  
  Finally, double-stop seagulls indicate artificial harmonics to be played on 2 strings at the same time while sliding up and down the fingerboard. 
  
  In the performance notes for Journey, Raven outlines that “the quartet performing this work should contain a female player. This player will be the guide when all others are lost”. The guide initiates realignment. In moments of realignment, signified by the symbol below, the guide cues the quartet to resync at the next section. Raven likens the process of losing one’s place, then re-syncing to a journey. “With their bows, these wanderers sought out others like them, knowing that they could survive by finding these other clans who resided in the east, others who shared their linear cosmologies. It is told that throughout the journey, in their own passage of time, this group became the very people they were seeking” (Chacon 2016).
  
  Credits: 
  
  Full score and images from it available at both Raven Chacon's website and on Kronos Quartet's 50 for the Future site. 
  
  Resources: 

  • Chacon, Raven. 2016. Program Notes for The Journey of the Horizontal People Composed for 50 For The Future: The Kronos Learning Repertoire.  https://50ftf.kronosquartet.org/composers/raven-chacon 
  • Raven Chacon website: http://spiderwebsinthesky.com
  • Huberman, Anthony. N.d. "On Raven Chacon" https://wattis.org/browse-the-library/911/essays-about-exhibitions/i-on-raven-chacon-i-by-anthony-huberman
• 1 media/Dawn Avery.jpg 2022-06-02T01:37:21+00:00 Indigenous Composers - Violin Repertoire 10 plain 2022-06-08T17:09:51+00:00 Every violinist is familiar with the standards in the instrument's repertoire.  However, the desire to discover, perform and enjoy music composed by underrepresented groups (ex. non-male, BIPOC) is growing.  To make your search easier, I have compiled the list below of solo violin, string quartet, and other chamber works written by Indigenous composers.  Music by Black Composers, a project by the RBP Foundation, put out a list of repertoire for violin and orchestra compiled by Rachel Barton Pine and Dr. Megan E. Hill.  This was my inspiration.
  
  

  Dawn Avery 

  Ohnekha'shòna Yakònkwe

  -2020

  -violin, prepared piano

  -commissioned by Duo Concertante

  -honoring Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG)

   

  Raven Chacon

  Lats’aadah

  -2004

  -solo violin

  -written for Mark Menzies

  (Bury Me) Where The Lightning [Will] Never Find Me

  -2019 

  -bass clarinet, violin, cello, percussion

  -commissioned by Arraymusic

  Horse Notations

  -2019

  -flute, string quartet, 2 hand drums

  -commissioned by Oregon East Symphony

  Journey of the Horizontal People

  -2016

  -string quartet

  -commissioned by Kronos Quartet

  Double Weaving

  -2014

  -string quartet

  -commissioned by ETHEL Quartet

  Pointillismo

  -2001

  -string quartet

  Biyan

  -2011

  -flute, clarinet, violin, cello, percussion

  -commissioned by Ensemble Music New Mexico

   

  Brent Michael Davids

  Wood That Sings

  -2019

  -solo violin

  -commissioned by Dr. Katherine McLin

  Tinnitus Quartet

  -2005

  -string quartet

  -commissioned by Miró Quartet

  The Last of James Fenimore Cooper

  -2001

  -string quartet, narrator

  -written for Miró Quartet

  -commissioned by the Caramoor International Music Festival

   

  Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate

  Pisachi (Reveal)

  -2013

  -string quartet

  -commissioned by ETHEL Quartet

   

  Abitahánta’: The Hunter Who Was Not So Great

  -2021

  -solo violin, narrator

  -commissioned by Katie Lansdale

  Shawi’ Imanompa’ (Raccoon Talk)

  -2019

  -solo violin

  -commissioned by Katie Lansdale

  MoonStrike

  -2019

  -string quartet

  -commissioned by Apollo Chamber Players

  Oshta (Four)

  -2017

  -solo violin

  -commissioned by Irina Muresanu

  Standing Bear: A Ponca Indian Cantata in Eight Tableaux

  -2016

  -baritone, piano, string sextet

  -commissioned by Hildegard Center for the Arts

   

  Melody McKiver 

  Odaanaabag

  -2019

  -string quartet, pre-recorded electronics

  -commissioned by Jumblies Theatre and Sound-streams

  Trio on Themes by Sadie Buck

  -2021

  -violin, viola, vibraphone