It is a new year of teaching piano. Involved with this is helping students find repertoire for upcoming competitions. One national music organization that focusses on American composers (hurray!) released a new compendium of eligible works for the next four years of competitions. I’ve been going through the listed works, which vary from very early to very advanced musical repertoire.
I am struck that in the Primary levels there are at least two “native American inspired” tunes that cause me to question if it is appropriate to assign these works to my students: The Swinging Sioux by William Gillock, and Apache Braves by Dennis Alexander. Both of these composers are very-well respected. Still, I’m a bit surprised to see these in the repertoire list, particularly after all that has come to our attention in the last decade or two. Both of these works use various stereotypes we’ve come to associate with children’s “Indian” music, and which have little to nothing to do with First American culture.
So, I googled my question about appropriateness of these kinds of tunes, and one of the first articles that came up was this one, which I think sums up the concept clearly enough:
I don’t fault the composers who wrote these tunes. I happily (and naively) played many of these tunes as a kid. However, I have considered this from a contemporary composer’s perspective, and I believe it is necessary to stop assigning these titles.
A Composer’s Perspective
There are many subjects of another’s experience that could easily inspire me to compose: e.g., the struggles of Black Americans or the beauty of First American philosophies. There have been several works I’ve imagined on these subjects but which I’ve chosen not to write. This is because I cannot identify a message to communicate about these subjects that might resonate with another.
What I would compose would reflect how I, as an outsider, relate to subject matters that are deeply personal or sacred to another. Particularly when I come from a strong position of privilege, the gap between my and another’s experience can seem too wide to allow my music to speak for their experience.
The times I have chosen subject matters such as these for influences on my composition are times when the title of the work offers no reflection of that source. I chose to express myself privately and not assume to be speaking for those truly deep within these cultures.
This is a personal sentiment that may not resonate with others, yet it is real to me. When I amplify this sentiment through the lens of using demeaning tropes about other cultures for the basis of a composition or the basis of teaching an instrument, I have to conclude that it is necessary to stop assigning these titles. I am encouraged that others within the previously mentioned organization are bringing up the same concerns.
But is this is a simple question?
For me, appropriation is a strong and positive force within the arts, and it is something we can approach with both respect and growth. The Classical music tradition has a rich history of appropriation, from Mozart and Beethoven borrowing from the Turks, Debussy borrowing from a white-washed Eastern tradition, Dvorak emulating American Spirituals, and the rich integration of the roots of Jazz into American music.
I admit that appropriation is a fuzzy line worth constant examination. Debussy’s Golliwog’s Cakewalk has its own dark sources. I still teach it, albeit with a bit of history. Probably because of the work’s significance within its genre, I see a strong line of difference between Golliwog’s Cakewalk and the dumbed-down mischaracterizations of our local indigenous cultures. (My home state of Arizona is home to many indigenous cultures.) That I embrace potentially different standards of cultural respect still makes me a little uncomfortable: all of these works have origins in mischaracterizations that originated with the intentional dehumanization of our brothers.
The Teacher’s Choice
As teachers, we are faced with making choices that we feel best reflect opportunity for our students and respect for our common humanity. Within our teaching studio, my wife Maria Flurry and I have made this one choice: we are not offering the option for our students to play these two primary pieces. I agree with the blog post I reference above – it would only serve to reinforce a negative, incorrect, and still too-common stereotype of our friends.