Excerpt via Term Daily news:
Miwok developed a powerful sense of music like a thread that collectively contains the Miwok people together, a tradition that still retains today since stories with the people are retold and even placed in print to be continued into the next generation and shared with additional cultures. Miwok legend and stories tend to be filled with reports of music as a foundation of ideas and concepts of every day living, in the two super and natural planets.
One of the most foundational of all Miwok legends encompases the music of nature and how a Falcon tried to catch the music and the tree that made it, the lah’pahi, the elderberry woods. “The forest sang; it sang at all times, day and night, as well as the song was good to hear. Wek’wek [the falcon] looked and took in and wanted he could have the woods. ” (Merriam, 2004, g. 70) the falcon in that case asked the star persons [gods] regarding the tree and the two goddesses advised him; “the tree whistled songs tat kept all of them awake all day long and all night so they could function all the time without grow sleepy. ” (p. 70) the falcon wished the elderberry tree so much that when he returned house he began a quest to purchase it through the goddesses. He was successful in his quest and brought it back to his home, where he was instructed by his father and grandfather that he could hardly have it exclusively that they had to plant everything over the country to provide music, medicine and food intended for the Mew’ko people these people were going to make.
Music is for that reason at the clear center from the creation history. Music may be the instrument that created question in the Falcon and made him bring the elderberry tree to his residence and then spread it across the land to develop music for future years people, presumably so they like the Goddesses could workday and evening and never turn into sleepy. (Merriam, 2004, pp. 70-73) in short the elderberry tree reaches the center with the Miwok creation story, and it was taken to the people by a curious falcon who loved the music that made. The flute was in fact probably an invention in the Miwok and other native people who derived the idea of the instrument form the manner in which atmosphere flowing through the hollow divisions of the elderberry tree produced music.
FLUTES of elderberry pierced by a row of holes, will be played at a 45 degree angle or nearly up and down and to a single side from the mouth, the player blowing throughout the thin end, opening and closing the finger holes to form the notes. Flute playing was a favorite hobby of young men and offered as an aid to courtship. Styles various from group to group. Four editions are illustrated above. inches (Pacific Traders “California Tribe Arts: Musical technology Instruments”) the Miwok have got a rich cultural history, that is significant and offers characteristics totally unique to it, which includes but not limited to Miwok structures (the utilization of cedar start barking as a building material) and creation testimonies peppered with an emphasis on the conformative power of music.
Bibliography
Holzman, Barbara, (ND) “Culture: Coast Miwok Indians” Retrieved The spring 12, 2008 at http://www.sfsu.edu/~geog/bholzman/ptreyes/introclt.htm
Pacific Investors “California Tribal Arts: Audio Instruments” Recovered April 12, 2008 by http://www.pacwesttraders.com/musical2.html
Merriam, C. They would. (2004) the Dawn on the planet Myths and Tales in the Miwok Indians of A bunch of states. New York: Kessinger Publishing
Miwok Cedar House/Reproduction (ND) Recovered April 12, 2008 by http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3f/House_Miwok_Yosemite_CA.jpg
Yosemite Maps (1908) “Miwok Territory” Retrieved Apr 12, 08 at http://www.yosemite.ca.us/library/maps/miwok_map_1908.png
Yosemite Maps Miwok Terrain
http://www.yosemite.ca.us/library/maps/miwok_map_1908.png
Miwok Cedar House/Reproduction
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3f/House_Miwok_Yosemite_CA.jpg listed below: Miwok Perspire Lodge Rendering https://64.241.25.143/pore/historyculture/images/pic_miwoksweatlodge_556x216_3.gif
Miwok Sweat Villa https://64.241.25.143/pore/historyculture/images/pic_miwoksweatlodge_556x216_3.gif
