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Of Navajo-Ute heritage, R. Carlos Nakai is the world?s premier performer of the Native American flute. He began his musical studies on the trumpet, but a car accident ruined his embouchure. His musical interests took a turn when he was given a traditional cedar flute as a gift and challenged to master it. As an artist, he is an adventurer and risk taker, always giving his musical imagination free rein. Nakai is also an iconoclastic traditionalist who views his cultural heritage not only as a source and inspiration, but also a dynamic continuum of natural change, growth, and adaptation subject to the artist?s expressive needs.
Nakai?s first album, Changes, was released by Canyon Records in 1983, and since then he has released over thirty-five albums with Canyon plus additional albums and guest appearances on other labels. In addition to his educational workshops and residencies, Nakai has appeared as a soloist throughout the United States, Europe, and Japan, and has worked with Grammy? winner flutist Paul Horn, guitarist/luthier William Eaton, composer James DeMars among many others. The famed American choreographer Martha Graham used Nakai's second album, Cycles, in her last work Night Chant. Nakai contributed music to the major motion pictures New World (New Line) and Geronimo (Columbia).
Nakai, while cognizant of the traditional use of the flute as a solo instrument, began finding new settings for it, especially in the genres of jazz and classical. He founded the ethnic jazz ensemble, the R. Carlos Nakai Quartet, to explore the intersection of ethnic and jazz idioms.
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Indigenous in the News Featured Artist Review
R. Carlos Nakai - Talisman
By:
There are riders like Lance Armstrong that spend days on the seat of a two wheel horse, hour after hour of rhythmic stroking looking for no destination in particular but merely obsessed with sweat, the beauty of nature and the freedom of choice. I do enjoy the stop by the river to watch the sun come up over the east bank of the Mississippi on a summer day strewn with sadness and glory of golden grief. I?ve been waiting for a moment like this so that I can review R. Carlos Nakai?s latest CD Talisman.
?Of Navajo-Ute heritage, R. Carlos Nakai is the world's premier performer of the Native American flute. Originally trained in classical trumpet and music theory, Nakai was given a traditional cedar wood flute as a gift and challenged to see what he could do with it.?
?Since 1983, he has released over 35 albums on the Canyon label. In addition to his solo appearances throughout the United States, Europe, and Japan, Nakai has worked with guitarist William Eaton, flutist Paul Horn, composers James DeMars and Phillip Glass and various symphony orchestras.? I won?t spend words on reciting grampa Carlos? accolades, awards and recognitions. Suffice it to say that they are numerous and prestigious.
?A Navajo healing, the Night Chant ceremony, is administered as a cure for most types of head ailments, including mental disturbances. Each day entails the performance of certain rites and the creation of detailed sand paintings.
?The medicine man proceeds by asking the Holy People to be present, then identifying the patient with the power of the god and describing the patient's transformation to renewed health with lines such as "Happily I recover." The same dance is repeated throughout the night, about forty eight times. Altogether the Night Chant ceremony takes about ten hours to perform, and ends at dawn.?
The first track, Song Of Darkness signifies that we begin in darkness and move toward the light. The overtones of this piece are haunting and classic. The tasteful use of delay is important in highlighting the over tones of the flute.
Obsidian Talisman the second track speaks to ?a naturally occurring volcanic glass formed as an extrusive igneous rock, obsidian was used in points for arrows.? This piece starts out sharp with a soprano voiced flute that is shrill and represents a sharpness then moves into a dual flute motif with emphasis on the overtones created between two notes.
In the song Glimmering Dawn the sun moves from it?s house into the glimmering dawn. This piece features two flutes playing off each other with different voices, one soprano, and one alto with the delay providing overtones as if they?re being played in a canyon. I can see Carlos practicing in the canyon the sound echoing off the high rock walls.
The song White Shell Talisman refers to the ?White shells (also known as Cowry shells or Sacred Miigis Shells) . . . used by aboriginal peoples around the world, but the words "white shell" and "Miigis Shell" specifically refers to shells used by Ojibwa peoples in their Midewiwin ceremonies.?
Having begun in darkness, in the song Sunrise Prayer, In Beauty we have finally come full circle to the sunrise. We give thanks in the traditional Dine fashion for everything is in beauty. It is the beauty way. A cosmogony that tells us that we give thanks everything is as it should be, everything is beautiful in its own way, the gift of life should never be taken for granted. This piece includes the traditional chanting song of a prayer. This song a person breathing sound sample and an eagle bone whistle in it as it represents a finale to the ceremony.
Carlos Nakai has gone back to his Ute-Navaho heritage and he has done so brilliantly giving us his own version of the Night Chant ceremony. Thank you Canyon Records for having the fore sight to see clearly how much this one individual Native musician could mean to our people. To all people for that matter.
It?s time to mount up and roll on, life has its demands and it calls but to stop and smell the roses, or feel the cedar breathe, to dance in my own way, to see the sunrise on a new day, hear the call of coyote and not speak wisdom but experience it, to seek harmony with my universe and believe in life rather than obsess over my mortality are all things given to me by my creator making me realize that I am truly blessed. The wind blows the sand painting away into memory and legend.
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