Music in its Relation to the Religious 

 Thought of the Teton Sioux 



By Frances Densmore 



NDIAN music is essentially vocal, though the pounding 

 drum and resounding rattle force themselves so insistently 

 on the ear of the listener. No degrees of tone are produced 

 by these instruments. Quality of tone is the only element 

 sought in their manufacture, and their only purpose is to 

 punctuate the rhythm of the song or to quicken the movements of the 

 dancers. The only instruments made by the American Indians that 

 produce degrees of tone are the flageolet and the long whistle. The 

 former, known as the "courting flute", has usually seven finger-holes 

 and produces a wide range of tones, while the whistle has no finger- 

 holes and gives a part of the series of tones procurable from an open 

 pipe, the number of such tones depending on the length of the whistle. 

 These instruments, however, are not used with sufficient frequency 

 to form a basis for the music of the race. It is said that many primi- 

 tive peoples base their music on the fixed tones of their musical instru- 

 ments, the vocal music being, in a sense, an imitation of the instru- 

 mental. But the foregoing facts show that this can scarcely be a 

 correct observation concerning the music of the American Indians; 

 indeed, in studying the oldest available Indian music it seems prob- 

 able that we are observing a psychological and physiological manifes- 

 tation which is not influenced to a marked degree by any artificial 

 standards. 



In considering the subject of this paper we will first note the tradi- 

 tional origin of song among the tribes studied by the writer, namely, 

 the Chippewa, Sioux, Mandan, Hidatsa, and northern Ute. The 

 statement current in these tribes is that, in the old days, all the songs 

 were "received in dreams". It is clearly indicated that no musical 

 instrument, either of percussion or of the flute type, was used to 

 hasten the coming of the song to the mind of the dreamer. Song was 

 regarded as a vocal expression which was supernaturally inspired, not 

 only in the fact of its being but also in the form which it assumed. 



"Religious thought" in this connection will be considered chiefly 

 in its personal sense. It may perhaps be said that organized religion 

 begins with the formulation of a system of beliefs, taught by an 



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