Friday night, the Kingston Chamber Music Festival will host the world premiere of “Woodland Songs” by Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate, performed by the Dover String Quartet. Because it’s a world premiere, we don’t have a recording yet to play for you. So here’s a little bit of his piece called “Shakamaxon” it’s from the first movement, “Remembrance.”
MUSIC: Shakamaxon I: Remembrance
Transcript:
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate: [Speaking in Chickasaw]. [MUSIC FADES] My name is Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate. I’m a citizen of the Chickasaw Nation here in Oklahoma, and I am a professional classical composer.
James Baumgartner: Welcome to The Public’s Radio, thanks for talking with me.
Tate: It’s a real honor and a privilege to be here. I really appreciate the time.
Baumgartner: I’ve seen your music described as combining the songs of the Chickasaw nation with classical music. Can you tell me how those fit together?
Tate: You know, all music really does fit together. And what I’m doing is honestly, it’s not historically unique. And in fact, it’s not even unique for today. You know, all artists combine their experiences, whether that’s ethnicity or cultural background or just personal experiences, into their art. And so all historic art that we talk about within history classes or anything like that, talks about all the influences of the artists. So a really great and obvious example is the Russian composers like Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, Rachmaninoff, Stravinsky, and Shostakovich. They were all very purposefully Russian in their music. And of course, between them, they were all exceptionally different composers. But yet they were all expressing their form of, or their views, and their experiences of, Russian identity. So that’s a really good example. You can take that across the globe. I mean, the French composers like Debussy and Ravel, Chinary Ung is a Cambodian composer and his music is incredibly Cambodian in his classical compositions. It’s really, really remarkable. Tore Takemitsu is a Japanese composer and his orchestrations are incredibly Japanese. So there’s so many historic examples. And of course we get into pop music and it’s all over the place, it’s really incredible.
MUSIC: Shakamaxon II: Moccasin Game
Baumgartner: One of your works that really stood out to me is Shakamaxon, the second movement, the Moccasin Game. Absolutely love the energy in that. Can you tell me about that work?
Tate: Absolutely. Well, that was commissioned by the Philadelphia Classical Symphony and they wanted to have a work that was dedicated to the Lenape people from that area. And so I dove into listening to some traditional Lenape music and moccasin songs are Lanape as well. Moccasin game is also called stick game or hand game. And this is a very common game around all of North America. But they are guessing games. It’s a game of chance. It’s kind of like gambling. But it’s basically a guessing game where you’re hiding, you know, like it’s some, oh, it’s also called like a bullet hiding game or something. It’s like you, you put it underneath either a cloth or hat. And in a lot of cases under a moccasin, that’s why it’s called moccasin game. So you’re hiding something and somebody has got to guess where it is. Well, these turn into very, very intense tournaments. And, there’s actually a very common musical style that’s all over Indian country, which is really remarkable to me that there’s a common musical style to it. It’s like this constant rhythm. That’s a lot of times you’re beating on sticks or on wood. There is a moccasin game tune. That is the source material for, that’s the musical material and the basis for that piece. But this is a very modernized version, a version of the moccasin game, of the Lenape. I just, I really enjoy doing that. I have very, very, deep pride and romantic feelings about being an American Indian and about my native community and my native cousins, all over the continent. And I really love showcasing melodies that the tribal members will recognize and feel pride and feel, you know, I want to, I want to give them a very large orchestral homage. And so, that’s, this is one example that happens in the moccasin game of Shakamaxon.
Baumgartner: The piece that we’re going to hear the world premiere of, the piece that we’re going to hear Friday is called Woodland Songs. Can you tell me about the piece?
Tate: Absolutely. Well, okay. So as I was introducing myself in my language, I said, Shawi’ Iksa’, which is my clan. I am Raccoon Clan from my father’s side of the family. And our clans, very much like Scottish clans that you hear of, we are all identified with woodland animals. And so in this particular work, it is, seven, five, sorry, five different movements about, five different woodland animals that happen to be clans as well. And honestly, I like to compose about our woodland animals, especially because they do relate to our clans. I just have a lot of deep connection to that personally. And so I like to express that, but probably the best way to describe how I treat that is, they’re like epitomes and epitome means like a small tome. So, they’re like small pieces, but they’re full of intensity. It’s almost like I’m turning our animals or woodland animals into Olympic gods, like little Olympic gods, and because that’s how I feel about them there. There’s so much historic and cultural history and meaning in our woodland animals, especially with our identification with the clans. And so that’s what I’m – I’m expressing all of those deep feelings, these very rhapsodic, romantic, you know, theatric feelings that I have about our cultural ancestry.
Baumgartner: Is there something you are trying to convey to the audience that will hear Woodland Songs?
Tate: Oh, lots of feelings. lots of theatrics. I am really hoping that the audience feels like they’re on a sonic adventure. And so regardless of whether they’re familiar with American Indian melodies or ethos or anything like that, I just, I want them to feel, you know, included in, in some kind of a narrative that maybe they haven’t been included in before. And, you know, I will say that that’s what I feel when I listen to great music, regardless of the style or the time that it was written to me, time doesn’t really exist in art. It’s all now, now, and it always has been now, now, you know, it’s just now. And so, I enjoy all art as if it was just either painted today, choreographed today or composed today. And that’s exactly what I want the audience to feel. I want them to feel in the moment that it’s now that it’s a new feeling maybe for them. but, but more than anything, I want them to feel like they’re on a theatric adventure.
MUSIC: Shakamaxon II: Moccasin Game
Baumgartner: Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate, thank you for joining me for Artscape today.
Tate: Well, it’s been a real pleasure. I really appreciate being here.
You can see the Dover Quartet’s world premiere of Jerod Tate’s Woodland Songs along with works by Jesse Montgomery and Antonin Dvořák. Friday night at 7:30 at Edwards Hall on the URI campus. And Tate will be part of a panel discussion tonight (Thursday, August 1) about the relationship between Native American culture and classical music. That’s at 7:00 PM, also in Edwards Hall.
