Native American Protest Music of the 1960’s

     Music is a motivator.  Words set to music carry an enhanced emotional impact: throughout history, protest against current injustice and visions of a better future have been communicated in song. Protest Music is intended to bring notice to and encourage the protest of social problems such as poverty, war, racial issues, and more.  Most protest songs are found composed in the folk music style. The reason for this is the style is simple and allows the lyrics to be heard and easily digested. The songs are intended to encourage and to continue the struggle.

     While certainly, protest songs have been sung throughout human history, the oldest recorded protest song, “The Cutty Wren,” comes from 14^th century England.  In the 1393 Peasant’s Revolt, the song brought energy and camaraderie  to those acting against the oppression of feudal landlords.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/protest_song

     In America, military songs incited action and encouraged patriotism in the Revolution as in later conflicts.   The earliest protest songs in America, not surprisingly, were sung by slaves.  Many of these are familiar as spirituals and hymns of today, though we often are not aware of their origins. Some examples are:  "Steal Away," "Go Down Moses (Let My People Go)," "We Shall Be Free" and "Run To Jesus," the song Frederick Douglass said inspired him to escape slavery in 1838. (www.pbs.org/independentlens/strangefruit/slavery.html)[i]  The nineteenth century, then gave rise to protest music in America.  These songs were fashioned by the events of the time in the Christian hymn style. They addressed the issues of slavery, survival, and the strife of war.  These early protest songs were intended to appeal to the social consciousness of the society while at the same time provided spiritual strength and determination to those being distressed by the more dominant portions within the society. Over time, the songs became more overtly political (see endnote i), advancing abolition and decrying the devastation of the Civil War. A couple of the most popular songs of that time were “when Johnny Comes Marching Home and “No More Auction Block For Me”.  

     The movement for women’s suffrage was also energized and popularized in song.  Julia Ward Howe was famous for the Battle Hymn of the Republic, which actually took its melody from an earlier song about John Brown, hung for his leadership of a slave insurrection. Less known is her “Suffrage Song” which used the melody from “America”, the national anthem, but began “My country ‘tis of thee, To make your women free, This is our plea.”(www.pbs.org/independentlens/strangefruit/slavery.html)

   It was also during the nineteenth century that the first protest songs by Native Americans became known.  These were the songs related to the Ghost Dance. Wovkoa, a Paiute messiah, brought the Ghost Dance to Indian People, based on a vision of an apocalypse where the earth opened up and white men disappeared, but Indians remained to greet the return of buffalo and of their ancestors and the dawning of new and better life.  The Ghost Dance and its songs in their most outward representations protested  U.S Government policy as it related to the removal and confinement of American Indians. The songs also offered spiritual strength to the people. The words and vocables of these songs talked of the rebirth of those killed in battle, of the new day which was coming, and the return of the buffalo.  This Movement gave birth and first insight to today’s contemporary pow wow. The ghost dance finds its origin among the tribes of the American Prairie. Some of these tribes were the, Kiowa, Pawnee, Sioux, and Hidatsa.  While obviously political in nature, the Ghost Dance was not directly militaristic: the message was that Indian people needed to prepare for the better day which was coming.  However, the gathering, especially the singing and dancing of Native people was feared by white American soldiers and government officials. Such fears were evident in federal reaction to the Ghost Dance at Wounded Knee; leading to military assault on the ceremony on, December 29th. 1890. Soon after this event, the US government banned all forms of song and dance on Indian reservations. This moved many of the native ceremonies underground.

 Many songs were lost as a result of federal prohibition on Indian singing, dancing, and drumming. This loss was bemoaned by Sophie Koshiway, an Otoe Elder (now deceased) and Southern Style traditional powwow dancer, who eagerly discussed her childhood memories with Dr. Lita Mathews.  (2000: “A powwow Summer Across North America”)   The voice of Sophie Koshiway was recorded and oral history preserved.  In her oral interview with Dr.  Mathews, Mrs. Koshiway, mentions the dances of her childhood. Each dance was accompanied by song. These songs always related to spirituality, environmental harmony, and honoring warriors. These are her words:

     “It was a sacred thing to us as Indian people…..Back then we called it religion. It was giving thanks to God, so we sung songs and we danced. …..We had different dances…..the Ghost Dance, the Sun Dance, the warrior Dance, and the Bean Dance. All of those dances and songs are gone today because White people didn’t want us to have them”.  (Need page number from the book)

 Throughout America, protest songs arose appropriate to the issues of the day.

A PBS special on protest music established several chronological “types” between the resistance songs of slavery and abolition, through the 1960s, the period on which we are concentrating.  Workers’ songs, during early labor organizing, for example, in the period 1900-1930, were actually published in songbooks distributed to encourage strikes in American cities.  Best known from this era were the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World) or “Wobblies,” who masterfully combined song and activisms on behalf of workers’ rights.  Joe Hill was probably the most famous of Wobblie songwriters. Like Julia Ward Howe, he put new words of protest and resistance to old, well-known tunes.

  In the Depression era, Woody Guthrie’s songs evoked the suffering of the dustbowl while Abel Meerpol, a Jewish teacher in the Bronx wrote the words to an anti-lynching song, “Strange Fruit” (“Southern trees bear a strange fruit; blood on the leaves and blood at the root; Black body swinging in the Southern breeze, Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees..”) later made famous by Billie Holladay.  The bitter realities of life were set out there for those better off to acknowledge.

Woody Guthrie, Peter Seger and others on the Folkways label took up race issues, especially in relationship to poverty and workplace discrimination. Meanwhile, probably the best known protest song in the country had its origin in the mid-20^th century in South Carolina: “We will overcome.”   Workers in the Negro Food and Tobacco Unions took up the words of this 1900 gospel song and changed it some, creating “We shall overcome.”

The civil rights era in which “We shall overcome” was heard across the country and on freedom trains to Washington DC for the 1963 March generated camaraderie and energy, had many other and varied rallying songs. Joan Baez and Bob Dylan wrote anti-war songs,  as did Buffy Saint Marie.  Marvin Gaye, Malvina Reynolds, and Credence Clearwater Revival are other well known names from this period,

  Protest songs by Native Americans of the 1960s are poorly documented, perhaps because the topic is too recent and participation of Indians in “the movement” little recognized.  However Native musicians and song writers of this time also produced songs which addressed the social problems, poverty, and raciest views of White America. During that time Native people found friendship and compassion among other oppressed people of America, such as Blacks, Mexicans, and women who were well versed in songs of protest.  In Indian Country, the most popular Native American protest song is the song composed in 1969 for the American Indian Movement (AIM) by the Porcupine Singers of South Dakota. It was during the late 1960s and early 1970s that this song became the recruitment and rallying cry of protest to the ill-fated policies and numerous broken treaties by the United States Government.  The song drew hundreds of Native Americans and non-Indian sympathizers to Pine Ridge to participate in the protest. The AIM song grew in popularity with the Indian takeover of Alcatraz. In 1973 due to the standoff at Wounded Knee, South Dakota, on the Pine Ridge Reservation, the AIM song became at hit on Indian radio stations and at all powwows. As the issue of the Wounded Knee occupation and protest became known throughout the United States and around the World, via the news media and the many talk shows which chose to highlight the struggles of the American Indian, the AIM  song was featured.  

   It was also during these struggles by Native Americans for the right to representation, autonomy and self determination that several Native American contemporary song writers emerged. By not having total access to the main stream radio and music producers, many of the songs became known through the grass roots, alternative music underground.  Even though the majority of the American population never heard these songs, they did gain recognition and popularity in Europe.    Some of the better known Native song artists of that time were Floyd Red Crow Westerman, Buffy Sainte-Marie, and Tom Bee. 

Floyd Red Crow Westerman, a Dakota Sioux was born in 1936, was first known as a country music singer. However as his own cultural awareness grew and frustrations with the social conditions of American Indians, his song writing began to reflect the social distress of Native Nations, and the historical social dominance by the United States government and American Corporate interests. He spent time exploring and comparing through song, an analysis of the European influences on Native American communities. In the beginning Floyd Westerman found it difficult to attract the interest of recording companies to record his music. As the social consciousness of all Americans began to change his music began to be heard. He then found opportunity to collaborate in song writing with many contemporary artists such as Jackson Brown, Willie Nelson, Joni Mitchell Bonnie Raitt, Harry Belafonte, Kris Kristofferson, and Sting, as well as Buffy Saint- Marie. Many of these and other contemporary musicians recorded and made several of his songs popular. One of his earliest songs which gained some popularity was recorded in 1969, titled “Custer Died for Your Sins”.  The album with this title was based on conversations he had with Vone Deloria, and so bore the name of Deloria’s book and became a popular bumper sticker still seen today. This album, as described by Patti Jo King in her Indian Country Today article on the death of Floyd Westerman (December 14, 2007) “became the background music of the emerging Red Power Movement.” Westerman went on to appear in films (''Son of the Morning Star'' (1991), ''The Doors'' (1991), and ''Clearcut'' (1991)) “Dances with Wolves”), television ‘Walker, Texas Ranger.'' Westerman also made repeat appearances in the 1990s TV series ''Northern Exposure'' and ''Dharma and Greg.''), and to work in grass roots organizing around the country. He became “one of the most recognizable American Indians of the 20th century.” (King, idem).      

    Buffy Saint-Marie, A Canadian (First Nations Cree) Indian was born in 1941.  She became a singer in 1960. Her folk style of music was found to be soul soothing. In the early 1960s she gained recognition through performances in coffee houses, Folk concerts, and performances on Indian reservations. She was able to find some light in the mainstream of popular music, with the result that many of her compositions were sung and recorded by other artists such as Barbra Streisand, Elvis Presley, Chet Atkins, Janis Joplin, Roberta Flack, Neil Diamond, Tracy Chapman and The Boston Pops Orchestra and Taj Mahal.  Many of her protest songs focused on the dominant society in which Native Americans participate. Examples of these were her songs about the Viet Nam War. In 1963 Buffy Sainte-Marie witnessed the return of wounded soldiers to the United States as the United States Government denied its involvement in the South East Asian conflict. This inspired her to write the protest song titled “Universal Soldier”. While her inspired song writings produced several recorded albums, and her songs were being picked up and recorded by such musical groups as Roberta Flack and Donavon, she was working on her first major album release.

     In 1967 Buffy Saint-Marie released on the Vanguard record label the music album titled “Fire and Fleet and Candlelight”. From that album several hit singles were generated. Throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s she made several appearances with protest music notables such as Pete Seeger. Also during this time she wrote the songs “Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee” and “The Big Ones Get Away.”  This work was later recorded and released in 1992 and the album was dedicated to the struggle and imprisonment of Leonard Peltier.

   Tom Bee, the song writer and musician was born and raised in Gallup, New Mexico near the Navajo Reservation. Best known as founder and featured artist with the popular 70's music group XIT, A single from the latter album entitled "Reservation of Education" went on to become a top 5 selling record in France and other European countries in 1973. The political overtones of Bee's lyrics kept them from ever achieving superstar status in the United States, but the group developed a cult status in America and Europe, which has allowed their music to survive for the last born and raised on. He is best known for his founding of Sound of America Records and the rock band XIT. Tom Bee found a musical journey through his song writing which led him to employment at Motown records, where he assisted in the composition of music recorded by Michael Jackson, The Jackson Five, Smokey Robinson, and the band Rare Earth. While at Motown in the late 1960s, Tom Bee had the opportunity to produce and make the initial recordings of songs which expressed the plight and exploitation of American Indian People.  In spite of the importance of his music, Bee never achieved the “rock star” status he deserved.  In an undated article about Tom Bee, located on the web site for the New Mexico Music Commission, there was reference to him and his band XIT: “these Guys are to Indians like the Beatles were to the White folks”   Some of his most notable songs were “Plight of The Red Man”, Silent Warrior” and Reservation of Education”.  Many of his songs were identified with and became the contemporary sound of the American Indian Movement (AIM).

   Other Native musicians who had began to make successful musical inroads into Mainstream music such as Rita Coolidge, Tori Amos, Robbie Robertson, John Trudell and the rock band Red Bone began to record songs related to the American Indian and the injustices toward Indian people by the United States Government and American Corporations.

   In conclusion, the protest music of Native American people has taken various forms and served various functions over time.  It has a long history before and a continuing presence after the nineteen sixties. Native American songs of protest continue to grow in popularity among native and non-Native people.  The reason for this is because the struggle of Indian People in North and Central America is on going, and has been for more that five hundred years. In this contemporary time which we live Native American people are becoming more familiar with the sentiments of the American dominant society and the unleveled playing field which is given. This is due to more Native people moving to and living in urban communities.  From these new life altering and controlling experiences, new songs are written to address these issues, while using reminders of the past. Many of the issues addressed are the same struggles for Native Americans since the first arrival of non Indian people on the American shores.  These songs are made popular on the contemporary stage and in the powwow arenas. These new Indian contemporary songs of protest now range in genre from blues to hip hop, revealing an openness to influence by other music and other groups while sustaining a Native perspective.

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References:

Books:
Dumbar Ortiz Roxanne, (1977) The Great Sioux Nation, Published by The American Indian Treaty Council; Information Center, New York City NY.

Mathews Lita Ph.D. (2000) A Pow Wow Summer Across North America; Published by, Gathering of Nations

Websites:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/protest_song

http://en.wikipedia.org/Native_Americans_in_the_United_States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floyd_Red_Crow_Westerman

http://www.newmexicomusic.org/noteable.php?select=15

http://en.wikipedia.org/Buffy_Saint_Marie_

http://www.creative-native.com/biograp.htm 

http://en.wikipedia.org/Wounded_Knee_Massacure

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Indian_Movement

http://www.indiancountry.com/content/cfm?id=106511101

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