Aaron A. Fox

Big news!

This afternoon, the Iñupiat History, Language, and Culture Commission, made up of elders representing each community of the North Slope Borough of Alaska (plus one at large), and charged with handling cultural resource affairs on behalf of the communities, unanimously voted in favor of a motion to support a framework proposed by Aaron Fox and Chie Sakakibara to formally hand back the publication rights in Laura Boulton's 1946 Barrow recordings of Iñupiaq songs and stories to the tribe, while licensing back non-profit scholarly use rights to Columbia University and other holding institutions. The motion was made by Chairwoman Elsie Itta and seconded by Dr. Edna Ahgeak MacLean, and approved on a unanimous voice vote. (I also want to thank Kathy Ahgeak, departing Chairwoman of the Commission, for helping us through yesterday's workshop session and her role in getting us this far over the past couple of years.)

As far as I am aware, this is the first time such a thing has ever happened in the repatriation of Native American music recordings. It has taken myself and Dr. Chie Sakakibara several years of diligent fieldwork and relationship-building to reach this point, with the amazing support of many elders, leaders, and members of the Iñupiaq community, our adoptive families there, the National Science Foundation, and Columbia University.

Quyanaqpak to everyone and especially to members of the IHLC Commission.

Work remains to be done. The University must now draw up an agreement within this framework and that agreement must be approved by the IHLC Commission (which would function as the holder of the publication rights, with all future income from these rights to revert to the tribal Heritage Center). Other parties -- especially the Native Village of Barrow government and the Arctic Slope Regional Corporation, must sign on with the agreement. But we hope to have this done in time for a formal handover of the publication rights on Thanksgiving in Barrow, hopefully at a dance, to honor the spirit of reciprocity I first experienced when I spent my first Thanksgiving with my Iñupiaq friends and family in 2007, and the meaning of that holiday to Native people throughout the US.

Columbia will commit to an ongoing partnership with the tribe to preserve and protect the recordings and to develop contemporary educational, cultural, and artistic uses in the Iñupiaq community for these recordings, related photographs, and the dozens of hours of oral history and contextual information Chie and I have collected about this collection from our many consultants and teachers in Alaska.

We've made history already with this framework approved and in place. "Repatriating" music and other intangible cultural heritage resources can work, and it can entail the return not only of objects but of rights to control those objects' uses in the future. This can be done in a non-adversarial and consensual way where everyone benefits -- tribes, artists, scholars, universities, and the general public.

We are on the verge of proving it, and today was a big step towards that.

What a rush!

Had a great early June trip to Barrow. Spring whaling had ended, and caribou and uguruk were a few weeks away, so it was time to go out for geese and ducks. Went out with Roy and Pamiuq a couple of times. Once again I learned so much about the Iñupiaq way of being, the way the hunter identifies with his prey, the importance of sharing and teaching, the patience that must be prepared to transform into highly coordinated action on a moment's notice, the meaning of the food we eat and the grace that comes from providing for others.

A very social visit -- the IHLC Commission meeting was postponed, so I wound up doing it by conference call this week, but that left a lot of time for hanging with my Iñupiaq friends and family.

Always hate to leave, and this trip was too darn short. I'll post a bunch of pics in a bit. Hoped to get back for Nalukataq, but it isn't happening, too much work work work here in New York. So now I'm thinking I'll make it up in early August.

Pamiuq Nageak brings in a nigliq goose.

Roy Nageak calls geese.

Aaron, armed and dangerous.

Quagak (ducks), temporarily stacked for giving away -- later Ernest will put these in the truck and deliver them to folks all over town. The hunter always shares.

Because I mentioned it in my last post . . . a big hit in 1979 and still a timeless performance.

Had to spend the day in a rental car last weekend. Luckily Alamo "upgraded" me (that's what they call it when they run out of the small cars) to a gas-guzzling Ford Edge SUV, which was quite fun to drive (and painful to refuel), but more than that, had Sirius/XM radio, meaning I could catch up with "Willie's Place," which is basically a station that plays all my old pals from Austin days plus the old shit that influences them. So along with all the Johnny Bush and Ray Price and Gene Watson (I have never listened to Willie's Place without hearing Gene do "Farewell Party," which is understandable because it's one of the all time great vocal performances in the history of the genre), Gary Stewart's 1974 smoker "Drinking Thing."

Gary was one of the great stylists of honky-tonk music, with a more rocked out edge than most, a quavery voice that worked with his self-immolating songs perfectly, and an inherent sense of the drama in his lyrics. Check out some of his other stuff at the youtube link above, especially "Ten Years of This," (a song which "cast a spell" on Bob Dylan -- warning, don't listen to this stuff if you're worried about breaking up with someone; DO listen if you just have and want to soak in misery). "Empty Glass" was always one of my favorites as well, and of course "Whiskey Trip." Great music, give it a listen.

Gary shot himself in 2003, following the death of his wife of 43 years, Mary Lou. I never met Gary, but I played with a bunch of guys who had worked for him over the years and everyone says he was also a good guy.

One of my all time favorite songs, Lyle Lovett's "LA County," from a live performance on A&E's "By Request." The song came out in 1988 on Pontiac.

Just about the tightest murder ballad of the modern era I can think of, although Johnny Paycheck's "Pardon Me, I've Got Someone to Kill" comes close (and I think inspired Lovett in this song in some way). I've embedded that song below, for your murderous enjoyment.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who's gotten through the rage stage of a broken heart (more than once) by playing this song on "repeat" and feeling the protagonist's blind death drive.

Just a little playing musicologist: the brilliance of this song's form is so simple and I have never seen it discussed in print. The song uses only 2 chords -- tonic and subdominant, or I and IV -- throughout its entire length until the very moment our hero pulls the trigger on his beloved and her betrothed, when he finally punches you in the gut with a dominant (V) chord for one last and transformed passage through the song's refrain (it's a strophic song form, but uses a repeating refrain, sort of a hybrid structure). It comes right on the words "forty-five," the caliber of our hero's pistol:

And they kissed each other

And they turned around

And saw me standing in the aisle

Well I did not say much

I just stood there watching

As that forty-five told them goodbye

This is country music at its most perfect: using an absolute economy of musical resources to perfectly support a gem-like lyrical exploration of the human heart's darker places, a perfect, simple matching of words and music. Lovett has written a lot of great songs, but this one stands apart for me in the canon of great American songs. That one moment is worth a thousand lesser songs, even when you know it's coming around once again. This is a timeless song.