Sounding Decolonial Futures: Decentering Ethnomusicology's Colonialist Legacies

Zeisberg 18 “Eagle Dance Song”

This arrangement, titled "Eagle Dance Song," bears a lot of similarities to #17, another piece sung by Moses Walking Stick of the Eastern Cherokees  and "recorded in June 1938." Again, we don't know anything about who did the recording: did Zeisberg witness the performance live or consult a recording made by someone else, in which case he might have credited that individual? It is also unclear where the recording was made. Later arrangements in the collection reference an Indian Fair. Did Zeisberg attended one of these, in Missouri or somewhere else, making the transcriptions on the spot? Did he travel to the Eastern Cherokee Reservation in North Carolina? There are some gaps in the historical record and we can only postulate possible answers.

It is likely that Zeisberg is entirely responsible for the harmonization and arrangement. If one compares the "First Impression of Eagle Dance Song" with the more fully harmonized and arranged version, I believe we have evidence here that Zeisberg heard a live performance, transcribed the melody he heard, then later harmonized and arranged the tune for piano. Zeisberg was clearly interested in adapting Indigenous materials to the piano, but it remains unclear to what ends. 

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