In the study of 18th Century music, the songs of Native Americans are very often overlooked due to the lack of readily available information about them. This website aims to provide some of the musical perspective of various Native groups in the Colonial era of the Americas.
This page describes some commonalities and generalizations about the music of American Natives. To see more specifics by regions or tribes, click the map below, or select its page from the sidebar.
How did Native American tribes see music?
Even among the near-infinite variety of Native American music, we find common threads. In general, music to Native Americans was – and still is – about carrying on a tradition of song and storytelling. The Garland Encyclopedia puts it well: “American Indian music is important not only because it influences modern American society, but also because it emphasizes the traditions and values of Indian people. This oral tradition has survived solely because the music and dance were too important to be allowed to die.” [1] The goal of carrying on the music was to keep the thread of musical tradition going, even if the music itself changed over the generations. In addition, music of Native American cultures often had narrative or spiritual aspects. “Creation narratives, migration stories, magic formulas, and ancient ceremonial practices tell of music.” [2] This shows that the stories of Native cultures contained music as a central element, and their customs and ceremonies involved traditional music.
What was this music like?
Styles and form vary widely across the continents. One thing remains true, however: the primary instrument was the human voice. Vocal works were widespread, including “solo pieces, responsorial songs in which the leader and chorus take turns, unison chorus songs, and multipart songs, some with rattle and/or drum accompaniment.” [3] This suggests that singing was the centerpiece of Native American cultures, with rattles, drums, and other instruments serving to back the singer rather than to be the focus of the performance. Every Native culture had some sort of drum and basic percussion instruments, regardless of region.
A Word on Sources
Sources on Native Americans in this time period largely come from European accounts and interactions. As such, these accounts often have a colored view of Native cultures, and especially music. Additionally, this means that not all regions or tribes are represented with the sources we have. This website should not be treated as all-encompassing list, and indeed even all of the information gathered can barely scratch the surface of the varied and colorful musical traditions of this time period. As the Garland Musical Encyclopedia says in its section about North American Native music, “although Native peoples have always valued music highly, its significance was largely overlooked by most early writers.” [4] Indeed, what the Garland Encyclopedia refers to as the “era of curiosity seekers” – the time when people began to seek out and study more Native American music – did not come about until well into the 19th Century. This makes pinpointing the exact musical culture of the Native tribes during this time period difficult if not impossible. As Glenda Goodman puts it, “Just as historians know there is no neutral way to understand colonial encounters, so too there is no innocent way to re-create colonialist music. The hierarchies of power present in all forms of interaction were (and are) present in musical interactions as well.” [5] This means that there is little way to recreate the Native music during this time period, and no way to do so objectively due to the nature of the sources we have.
In addition to the bias, sources from this distinct time period can be difficult to come by. As such, this website will often resort to interpolation; if a source says some element of Native music existed before the 18th Century, and that the element still existed after the 18th Century, then it is considered a safe assumption that the musical element persisted throughout the 18th Century. This sort of generalization, however, tells us little about the relative popularity of different musical elements during this time.
This website uses many academic sources for its material, and aims to try and construct an idea of Native American musical life in the 1700s while acknowledging the bias in the sources from the time. All of the sources used in this project are cited with shortened footnotes, and full citations of every source are available on the Bibliography page of this website.
[1] “Overview.” Garland Encyclopedia, p. 372
[2] “Overview.” Garland Encyclopedia, p. 366
[3] “Overview.” Garland Encyclopedia, p. 367
[4] “Overview.” Garland Encyclopedia, p. 467
[5] Goodman, “Conditioned Ears”, p. 382