MUSICAL ANALYSIS 



THE MATERIAL 



PERFORMANCE 



Instruments: 



Percussion instruments serve as background to singing. A whistle 

 tootles intermittently during the Little Water Medicine ritual, and 

 a six-hole flageolet courts for a lonesome lover. Dance instruments 

 are plied during dances by special singers seated on benches or by 

 dance leaders. Dancers, singers, and instrumentalists are identical 

 in the Medicine Men's round and in the Society of Women Planters. 

 Song leaders, one or two, of opposite moieties, strike a horn rattle 

 against the palm of their left hand in Corn, Hand-in-hand, Garters, 

 Pigeon, and Robin Dances — all of the choreographic stomp type. 

 In Feather Dance and False Face rites, one or two special singers 

 strike a turtle rattle mercilessly against the bench. In all other 

 cycles, except for the unaccompanied adgnwe and ga'daSo't stomp, 

 drum and horn rattle are combined in increasing numbers, from one 

 in Bear and Buffalo Dance to six or more in ^skanye and Fish Dance 

 type. The drum rests obliquely against the left knee; a wooden 

 beater follows the impulse of a relaxed right wrist. The horn rattle 

 can be struck against the thigh or the palm of the left hand. To 

 obtain a tremolo effect, it is shaken vertically or horizontally with 

 extended arm. Foot tramping and heel bumping intensif}^ the 

 pulsation. Extraneous noises increase the maskers' din — the huge 

 turtle-shell rattles of the False Faces and the staves of the Husk 

 Faces. 



The singers' bench occupies the floor center in most special 

 accompaniments. It rests against the men's west wall in rites to the 

 Midpantheon and in women's medicine rites. It serves as a dance 

 focus and seat for the patient, as well as an enhancement of tonal 

 volume. 



Singing: 



Musical abUity decides the selection of singers. This ability 

 appears particularly to belong to the male sex but does not entirely 

 neglect the matrons. Women monopolize the chanting in their 

 Society of Planters and they join the men an octave higher in their 

 own Medicine Societies and in two social dances, Shaking-the-bush 

 and Chicken Dance. The men have the resonant voices, and the 



27 



