Visions of Sound: Musical Instruments of First Nations Communities in Northeastern America - Softcover

Diamond, Beverley; Cronk, M. Sam; Rosen, Franziska Von

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0889202427 ISBN 13: 9780889202429

Publisher: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1995

Synopsis

The most comprehensive study ever undertaken of the musical instruments of First Nations communities in Northeastern North America, Visions of Sound focusses on interpretations by elders and consultants from Iroquois, Wabanaki, Innu and Anishnabe communities. The authors present these instruments in a theoretically innovative setting organized around such abstract themes as complementarity, twinness and relationship. As sources of metaphorâin both sound and imageâinstruments are interpreted within a framework that regards meaning as "emergent" and that challenges a number of previous ethnographic descriptions. Finally, the association between sound and "motion" â an association that illuminates the unity of music and dance and the life cycles of individual musical instrumentsâis explored. Featuring 166 black-and-white and 26 colour photographs of instruments from dozens of archival and private collections, dialogues among the co-authors and numerous interviews with individual music-makers, this is an important book for all ethnomusicologists and students of Native American culture as well as general readers interested in Native American mythology and religious life.

About this title

About the Author

Contact WLU Press for information about this author.

Edition details

• Publisher: Wilfrid Laurier University Press
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0889202427
• ISBN 13: 9780889202429
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 232