Learning to the beat of a different drum

By GARY REMAL
Staff Writer Monday, March 12, 2007

WASHINGTON -- More than a year ago Bill Pelkey, a Micmac Indian, decided to use drumming and singing traditional Native American chants as a way to emphasize the shared cultural heritage he has with his son Morgan. Together, the two formed the core of a new group known as a "drum," a word that represents both the instrument they call Mother Earth's heartbeat, and the people who play and care for the drum, Pelkey explained.

About eight people, most with Native American heritages of differing tribes and some spouses who are not Indians, are at the center of the group, Pelkey said. Most are from the greater Augusta-Waterville area.

But he calls "Two Feathers Drum" an educational drum, one that looks to share and demonstrate Indian culture in society, so Indians and non-Indians alike are welcome at the group's weekly practice sessions and even to join in at performances if they know the words and music.

"We'll go all over," the South China resident said. "We go wherever we're asked. The drum is for the people and we bring it to the people."

Sunday the group performed at Washington's Gibbs Library as part of the library's series of events aimed at providing cultural programs for members of the community, explained library board member and Selectwoman Kathleen Ocean.

"We have both a children's series and an adult series to bring people to the library," Ocean said.

About 60 people, many of them children, jammed into the library's meeting room to listen to the native drumming, music and traditional stories.

The audience included Rebekah Smith and her 3-year-old son Addison Mellor.

While the performers cautioned their audience that the drum beats can be loud and disturbing to young ears at times, the youngsters in the audience Sunday seemed unfazed and fascinated by the voice of both the instrument and the singers.

"He was interested. I was surprised," Smith said. "Initially he was not that interested. But when I explained that it was a drum, he was interested in the drumming."

Smith said she came on Sunday because she wanted to expose her son to an unusual musical tradition.

"Addison loves music and this obviously is a very different kind of music from what we are accustomed to hearing in our home," she explained.

Smith said she appreciated the way the Indian group explained what they were doing and why so their audience was familiarized not only with their music but with the cultural aspects behind the music as well.

Some of the music performed by the drum is sung in native tongues or traditional "vocables," chants that use sounds rather than words, Pelkey explained. But Two Feathers repertoire includes traditional music that has been translated into English to help audiences better appreciate the lyrics.

Each performance is begun with a ritual purification of the performers with herbs like sage. Then the drum is opened and prayers are made using tobacco to speak to the "Creator" and the drummers' ancestors.

Once the music begins, the beats can be harsh, sharp and very loud or quiet and murmuring to suit the tone of the message of the song.

The group's performance is also sprinkled with storytelling and other forms of music like that performed by Phil White Hawk of Palermo, a Cherokee Indian.

While members of the group come from different tribal backgrounds, White Hawk explained, the idea of the drum and the music that forms the basis for the organization brings together the similar parts of many different Native American traditions.

"They're all based on native traditions and values included in the music and things like story-telling," he said. "It's all part of an oral tradition."

White Hawk's wife, Connie Bellet, while not an Indian herself, participates in the performances with her husband and wears traditional dress to honor her mother in law.

Bellet explained that women in most Native American cultures are considered more directly connected to the power of the Earth.

While only men are allowed to play the drum, during performances the women encircle the men to protect them as they drop their masculine guard to play and sing. The spiritual roles of men and women are very different, Bellet said. Women are given the special connection with Mother Earth through child birth, Pelkey explained.

"They're quite separate but complementary," Bellet said. "Like a bird with two wings, you can't fly with just one. The male energy and the female energy complement one another so the whole is functional."

Pelkey said during the group's first year members of the drum performed about four times publicly. But as word gets out, he can see the demands on their time will increase, a function of their educational commitment.

"We don't charge. It's not about money," Pelkey explained. "If people want the drum, that's what we do."