He was honored in a naming ceremony when the
Tongva Tribe, the original people of the
Greater Los Angeles area, gave him the name,
"Mah–na–che–a–shun," which means “He
Sings With His Heart.” Elk Whistle also sang
for a number of years with the Red Spirit
Singers, a northern traditional powwow drum
group based in Southern California.
The following derives from an impromptu
talk that Elk Whistle was asked to give after
playing flute at the November 2007 Monthly
Sampai at Shumei America's National Center
in Pasadena. The November Sampai is
customarily set aside for honoring elders and
ancestors. The text has been edited for use in
this publication.
"I do not usually speak without my flutes in my hand.
Usually when I speak I tell stories about the songs that the flutes play.
Fifteen years ago, for some reason I was given the gift of playing
these instruments. The flutes that I play come
from a time when the world was still young and
all the living things on the Earth could still understand
each other and could still speak to
each other. When Native People talk about all
the living things on the Earth, we mean the
two–legged, the four–legged, the winged ones of
the air, the dwellers of the water, the creepy–
crawlies, the green things with roots that cling to
the earth, and even the stones of the Earth are
living things with a spirit and a voice and a will.
When I play these flutes, I always hope that
people hear within the voice of the flute that
connection between all other living things in the
circle of life.
The Lakota people of the Northern
Plains have seven sacred ceremonies, and in
all of their ceremonies they use an expression
in their language, which is “mitakuye oyasin.”
“Mitakuye oyasin” roughly translated
means “all my relations.” When they say “all
my relations,” they are talking about every
single living thing in the circle of life. Among
my people and among all Native People, we
talk about the sacred directions. Among my
people, the Cherokee or ‘Tsalagi,’ we talk
about seven sacred directions. The four cardinal
directions, East, South, West, and
North, represent all of creation. The fifth direction
is the Sky above, the sixth direction
is the Earth below, and the seventh direction
is Inside, at the Center.
When Native People talk about
standing at the Center, they mean
that they understand that they have
a hundred percent responsibility
for what they create in the world.
They are a hundred percent responsible
for how they live their
lives. There are things in the
world that we do not have control
over. What we do have control
over is how we behave when
things take place, how we react,
the decisions we make in response
to those things that
happen. The decisions and actions
we take in response to
all these things that occur is
how we create in the world.
Where you are right here,
right now, is the sum total of
every action and every decision
that we have ever made in our
entire lives that has brought us
to this point. We created it that
way. We are all creators, and as
creators, we have a hundred
percent responsibility to
every other living thing
in the circle.
These are things that I am still learning
myself. I am still learning how to live my
life. The flute that I played for you is a very
important flute to me. I always begin with it
and I almost always end with it. It is starting
to get a little battered–looking; it has water
spots on it from being rained on. I had a little
problem with that for a while. When I
would start playing, the wind would start
blowing and it would start raining. One of
my elders, a Kickapoo from Oklahoma, who
has since passed on, was very knowledgeable
in traditional Native People's ways. On
more than one occasion, he took me aside to
explain to me what my responsibility was in
playing these instruments. He told me about
a young man who was playing his flutes and
did not understand the power of the instrument
(because they are not just musical instruments),
and so it rained for six weeks
straight from his playing. The elder told me
to stick to the love songs, because one of the
traditional ways in which they were used
was by young men playing love songs for
young ladies.
I had to tell him that, in order to stay out
of trouble with the flutes, I had to be careful
about playing the love songs because I did not
want my wife to get upset with me. My flute is
starting to look a little battered, but it is the
flute that I used to welcome my
grandson into the world and to help
my elders pass on.
On the mouthpiece of the
flute is a black lump, the
lifeblood, the pitch of the
bristlecone pine tree of California.
Maybe some of you are familiar
with the bristlecones? If you go to
the Sequoia National Park, in the
Visitor's Center there you
hear languages from all over
the world from people who
come to visit those gigantic and
wonderful trees. But the bristlecone
pine is not a gigantic tree like the sequoias.
It is not as tall as the sequoias.
Bristlecone pines grow at ten– to
eleven–thousand foot elevations
in almost pure rock. They grow
in places where the wind blows
so hard and the snow on their
branches is so heavy that the
trees get broken and twisted. So,
they are very small and have
very twisted shapes. But there
is a kind of scientist called a
‘dendrochronologist’ that
is involved in studying
those trees. These scientists have discovered
that the bristlecone pines are the oldest living
things on the face of the Earth. There are
bristlecone pines here in California that are
nine to ten thousand years old, and they are
still growing. They are still putting out new
needles in springtime.
When my wife and I were there, visiting
those grandfather bristlecones, I asked for a
gift. I put a little bit of the lifeblood of one of
those grandfathers on the mouthpiece of my
flute. I hoped that when I played that flute, and
tasted the lifeblood of that grandfather, it
would remind me of something that I thought
I needed to remember. I am a grandfather,
too. I will be 65 on my next birthday. Sometimes,
there are people listening to my words
and my songs who are old enough to be my
grandfather, and yet none of us have been here
very long.
When they teach about the history of this
Earth that we all share in the schools, they
have a chart that goes all the way across the
top of the blackboard from one corner of the
room to the next corner of the room. The history
of the two–leggeds is at the very end of
the chart. And yet in our brief time on this
Earth, we have figured out how to destroy
everything - the water, the soil, the air - each
other - and the Earth itself. So when I play
my flute and I taste the lifeblood of that
grandfather bristlecone, I hope for my
sake that it helps me remember that I need to
live my life in balance. I always hope that it
helps give me a sense of perspective about
what my place is in the circle of all living
things. We owe one hundred percent responsibility
to every other living thing in the
circle. These flutes come from a time when
the world was still young.
Back in the 1960s, the Smithsonian Institution
took a look around in Indian country
to see where this instrument was still
alive. They only found six Indian men in
the entire country who were keeping this
instrument from becoming nothing more
than a museum exhibit. One of those was a
man named 'Doc' Tate Nevaquaya, an elder of
the Comanche people of southern Oklahoma.
The Smithsonian Institution made some
recordings of his music, and the state of
Oklahoma declared him a living treasure
before he passed on. This is an unusual
thing in this country, where most do not
have a tradition of revering our elders. Native
People of North America have always
revered their elders.
Today, after 500 years of living in a society
with a dominant culture that is different
than the Native way, a lot has been lost. Until
1978, there were laws in this country that
kept Native people from their religious ways.
It was only in 1978 and again in the early
1990s that laws were passed to give back to
the Native People the right of religious freedom
that everyone else takes for granted as
citizens of this country. Fortunately for us,
our elders have kept those old ways from
disappearing—the songs, stories, ceremonies,
and dances. We honor them for that,
and our elders mean a lot to us. They are respected
in our community, and we thank
them for what they have done for all of us
who have come later. This flute that I have
been playing today came alive again for a
reason. We are at a crossroads. There is an
old Ojibwe prayer that says, “It is only the two–
leggeds that are broken.”
Here in Southern California, there are
people from all over the world living side by
side, probably more so than anywhere else in
this country. We are all still learning how to
be human beings together. I always hope that
people can hear in the voice of the instruments
a reminder that we are all part of the circle. We believe
the spirits of our ancestors are still here
guiding us, so I am thankful for the opportunity
to be here today, as you honor your
ancestors, as well, and give thanks for that
which has been given to all of us. It is too
easy to forget in the day–to–day struggle to
meet the demands of life how much has
been given to us. Native People sometimes
get caught up in dealing with the hardships
that have been handed to them. But all people,
in one way or another, have hardships.
We have to remember how much has been
given to us. I am thankful that I can do what
I do. I have no musical training, and I did
not start playing until I was 50 years old. I
feel like this gift was given to me for a reason,
and so I do my best to try to live up to
the music in one way or another.
I always hope that people, when they hear
the voice of the flute, will understand what
my words are about."
Editor's note:
The bristlecone tree survives
the environment found at 10,000 to 11,000
feet above sea level, the bitter extremes of cold,
wind, aridity, and exposure to ultraviolet light,
by growing very slowly. This slow growth results
in a very hard wood, so resinous that it is
extremely resistant to decay and disease. A
hero of vegetation, this pine gets tougher as
conditions become harsher. In times of long
draught and cold, the bristlecone dies back,
leaving mostly deadwood and just a thin slip
of living bark to sustain its future life; then,
when more favorable circumstances come, it
grows again.
The highly alkaline soils favored by the
bristlecone, along with the other harsh conditions,
result in little underbrush or ground cover
in the terrain on which it grows, thus eliminating
competition for the scarce nutrients.
Known as the Methuselah Tree, named for
the longest–lived Biblical character, a living
bristlecone has been dated to over 4,900 years
old, making it among the oldest living things on
earth. Ironically, this oldest living bristlecone
discovered so far, the oldest on earth, was cut
down for research purposes—research that
eventually proved the tree's antiquity. When a
bristlecone pine at long last dies, its wood could
be so thick and resistant to weather and pests
that it might survive the elements and stand for
over a thousand more years.
Bristlecones live at high elevations throughout
the Southwest of the United States.
Shumei's English Language Bi-Monthly Magazine
Vol. 275 May/June 2008
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