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Go directly to: An Apprenticeship in North Indian Classical Bansuri ACTA Featured at the California Arts Council Meeting in Fresno San Diego Commission for Arts and Culture Announces San Diego Folklife Proceeds from the license plate sales will benefit the California Arts Council (CAC) To subscribe to the weekly CAC update, please visit their website. |
WHAT'S NEWSubscribe to The New Moon, ACTA's Monthly E-Newsletter. See the latest edition of The New Moon. Three California Traditional Artists Receive Nation’s Highest Honor
Violet de Cristoforo, Agustin Lira, and Julia Parker Last month, the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) announced this year’s recipients of the NEA National Heritage Fellowships, the country’s highest honor in the folk and traditional arts. Twelve fellowships, which include a one-time award of $20,000 each, were presented to honorees from nine states. The awardees were chosen from among 259 nominations on the basis of their artistic excellence, cultural authenticity, and contributions to their field. This year’s announcement coincides with the 25th anniversary of the National Heritage Fellows program. NEA Chairman Dana Gioia said, “I am pleased to celebrate the 25th anniversary with the announcement of such a diverse and stellar group of artists. In addition to the sheer excellence and cultural significance of their work, this year’s honorees demonstrate how vital is the role of persistence in pursuing an artistic journey. Creativity and talent so often take a profound level of dedication to develop into art that is, as in these cases, worthy of national recognition.” The Alliance for California Traditional Arts congratulates California’s 2007 National Heritage Fellows – Violet de Cristoforo, Agustin Lira, and Julia Parker! Violet de CristoforoViolet de Cristoforo, although born in Ninole, Hawaii, was sent to Hiroshima, Japan, at the age of eight for her primary education. She returned to the United States when she was 13 to attend high school in Fresno, California. Upon graduation she married Shigaru Matsuda and she joined a School of Haiku and became well known for her poetry in the kaiko or free style haiku form. Following President Roosevelt's Executive Order during World War II, she and her husband were removed to an internment camp in Jerome, Arkansas. In 1946, she was repatriated to Japan but she later resettled in the United States with her second husband. Over a period of 50 years she has both written haiku poetry and collected and translated haiku from the internment camps and the various haiku clubs. The culmination of her life's work is the anthology she edited entitled May Sky: There Is Always Tomorrow; An Anthology of Japanese American Concentration Camp Kaiko Haiku. Agustin LiraAgustin Lira was born in Torreon, Coahuila, Mexico. At the age of seven, he moved with his family to California in order to follow the crops with fellow farmworkers through the San Joaquin Valley. When he was 19, he co-founded El Teatro Campesino, realizing the power of artistic expression in uniting and inspiring the farmworker communities. His powerful singing and socially relevant lyrics served as the voice of the Chicano movement. Lira blended Mexican song traditions such as ranchera, huapango, and bolero with Anglo folk and popular musical forms to create works that are sung to this day. Hugo Morales, founder of Radio Bilingüe, a Harvard Law School graduate, and a MacArthur Fellow, says of Lira and Cesar Chavez, “As a young student they inspired me to study, do my homework and do well academically so that, as the only farmworker in my class who was on a college track, I could later help my farmworker brothers and sisters.” Lira was invited to perform at the Newport Folk Festival in 1968 and 1969. After leaving Teatro Campesino, he continued to work in music and theater and formed the musical group Alma. Lira has appeared on numerous recordings and has written songs featured in theatrical productions and film. Previous recognition of his work includes the Latino Legends of the 20th Century Award from the Central Valley Mexican American Association and the Local Hero Award from Valley Public Television. Also, for the past 42 years, he has taught theater, music, and/or creative writing in academic, community and arts organizations throughout California. Lira’s current organization, Teatro de la Tierra, is a current grantee in ACTA’s Living Cultures Grants Program. Julia ParkerJulia Parker has spent most of her years living and working in Yosemite Village in California. Although she was born in her native Pomo territory, her early teachers were elder Indian traditionalists and basketweavers of the Sierra Miwok and Mono Lake Paiute people. After her mother's death when Julia was five, she and her siblings were placed in a foster home and later sent to Stewart Indian School near Carson City, Nevada. There she met her husband to be, Ralph Parker, and in 1948 they married and moved back to the Yosemite area. Ralph was employed by the National Park Service and Julia worked as a housekeeper for the Yosemite Park and Curry Company. In 1960, Park naturalist Douglas Hubbard wanted to revive demonstrations of Indian basketweaving at the Yosemite Museum and Julia volunteered. With master elders as her teachers, most significantly Ralph's mother, Julia soon was demonstrating basketweaving in the park. She also revived the practice of making acorn meal and mush, which in the traditional way uses a basket for the cooking process. Julia's work has been featured at the National Museum of the American Indian, the Heard Museum, and the National Museum of Natural History. In 1983 when Queen Elizabeth II visited Yosemite, Julia gave her one of her baskets and today it is in the Queen's Museum in Windsor Castle. Julia has been a central figure in the organization and ongoing activities of the California Indian Basketweavers Association. Please visit the National Endowment for the Arts’ website to read more about these and other 2007 National Heritage Fellows. An Apprenticeship in North Indian Classical Bansuri
Pandit G.S. Sachdev (right) and Sheela Bringi Sherwood Chen, Associate Director, ACTA Considered one of the most celebrated and revered exponents of North Indian classical music and the bansuri (seven-holed bamboo flute), Pandit G.S. Sachdev, now in his 70s, maintains a full international schedule as a master teacher and performer on the road, with gigs in New York, Oregon, California, the Bahamas, Egypt, Canada, Europe, and South America in this year alone. Between his travels and work with myriad students throughout the world, his home base is in Marin County, where he has been working with bansuri apprentice Sheela Bringi as part of ACTA’s Apprenticeship Program. Sachdev began his musical career as a teenager, studying with Vijay Raghav Rao in Delhi, India, and subsequently with Ravi Shankar in Mumbai, India, prior to establishing Marin County as his home base for the past 37 years, where he has worked alongside myriad master musicians, yielding a prolific collection of recordings. Sheela Bringi began her bansuri studies from Chaitanya Kabir in Colorado, having performed and recorded with her father, mridungum (two-ended South Indian hand drum) percussionist V.N. Bringi, by the time she was 18 years old. In 2003, while in California as a student at Mills College’s Music Department in Oakland, Sheela initiated studies with Sachdev, and deepened her studies with him upon her graduation in 2006. “When I had the opportunity to meet him and experience not only the profound depth of the teachings he has to offer, but also his spiritual nature and generosity of character,” Sheela comments, “I have held a deep desire to learn directly under him for as long as I can.” During their apprenticeship, the pair has been focusing on three ragas (melodic modes) known as Brindavani Sarang, Hindol and Lalit. Each raga is explored in depth through both structure and improvisation. Sheela is learning the overall form and movement (Alaap, Jor, and Jhala) of the ragas; a traditional composition based on each raga; as well as underlying rhythmic structures, or talas, ultimately developing her own sense of mastery of the raga on the bansuri. In addition to becoming adept at the bansuri’s three octave range under Sachdev’s guidance, Sheela has been deepening performance techniques including half- and quarter-hole fingering and breath control. Coming from a family of musicians hailing from the South of India, Sheela was steeped in South Indian classical music, or Carnatic music, when she was young. Sheela’s work with Sachdev has demanded she develop fluency in Hindustani, or North Indian classical music, which differs significantly from her familial tradition. While both traditions of music originated from the same roots, they developed different trajectories, due in part to the five-hundred-year influence of Islamic music on North Indian music, and the continuing devotional emphasis through composer-saints in the music of the South. The low, deep tones of the bansuri initially attracted Sheela to North Indian music. She has now deepened her connection to the music through the interpretation of the ragas, which are seen as intimate expressions of human emotion and the cycles of time and nature. Along with bansuri training, singing practice is an integral aspect of Sheela’s work with Sachdev. The bansuri melodic repertoire is entirely based on vocal songs in Hindi and other Indian dialects. Thus, learning the songs, their nuances of melody and phrasing, and their pronunciation and meaning all directly contribute to her interpretation on the bansuri.
Jason Ranjit Parmar accompanies Sheela and Sachdev-ji on tabla during a lesson. In Sachdev’s illustrious career, he has had the opportunity be accompanied by esteemed master tabla players including Jnan Gosh, K. Paramjyoti, Zakir Hussain and Swapan Chaudhuri. Key to the artistry of a bansuri artist is his or her ability to interact with tabla accompaniment. This critical aspect of Sachdev and Sheela’s work together has included Jason Ranjit Parmar, musician, student of Hussain and Chaudhuri, and Sheela’s peer. Parmar has participated as a tabla accompanist in Sachdev and Sheela’s apprenticeship in order to increase Sheela’s ability to interact with the rhythmic beats and cycles of the tabla in her improvisation. “Improvisation,” Sachdev states, “is considered the most important part of playing bansuri. You have to express yourself, and make the connection between your mind and your hands when you play. “The bansuri serves as a powerful form of self-expression and of sharing the heart. I play and teach the bansuri because I hope to share the knowledge and pass on the pure classical musical tradition, to keep it alive amidst these changing times.” Unlike many musicians, Sachdev has devoted himself to “the rigors of infinite exploration within traditional pure classical Indian music,” shying away from fusion or experimentation of form and instrumentation. For Sachdev, classical music “allows us to stay in touch with our roots… and pass it on to our children and students. “[Sheela] has a deep desire to learn the traditional art form… and is a very promising apprentice. She will make a good performer and carry on the tradition to future generations.” In turn, Sheela considers Sachdev “a lifelong master teacher in my life, and myself as a lifelong student . . . a timeless Indian tradition of teacher-disciple training and mentorship.” Their mutual dedication to a two thousand-year old practice is reinforced by 21st century accessories—namely, Sheela’s laptop which she uses to digitally record and archive their lessons, and an electronic tabla machine, when a live tabla accompanist is not available. Sheela will reinforce and integrate her ongoing studies with Sachdev with her forthcoming graduate MFA studies in World Music and North Indian Music at the California Institute of the Arts. Sachdev’s modern day globetrotting, too, is all in the name of keeping the ancient bansuri tradition alive, fostered through scores of his dedicated students worldwide. Back home in California, he continues his work with Sheela from his living room, preparing lunch on occasion for Sheela and Parmar after their lessons together. While his status as an acclaimed master bansuri artist and teacher may overshadow his keen abilities as a cook, Sachdev modestly reflects, “A teacher is a regular person—and should be.” Creative Work Fund Announces $472,000 in Grants to Visual and Traditional Artists for Collaborative Art Projects
Mayan huipil (blouse), faja (belt) and falda (skirt) handwoven by Martina Jimenez. This year, the Creative Work Fund is supporting collaboration between Jimenez and the Centro Legal de Raza in Oakland. Last month the Creative Work Fund announced 15 grants totaling $472,000 for visual and traditional artists creating new works in Alameda, Contra Costa, Napa, San Francisco, Solano, and Sonoma Counties through collaborations with nonprofit organizations. The Creative Work Fund was created in 1994 by Bay Area foundations that wanted to contribute to the creation of new art works and to support local artists. It is now a program of the Walter and Elise Haas Fund that is supported by generous grants from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and the James Irvine Foundation. In 2001, the Creative Work Fund added a category for grants to traditional artists, in an effort to support excellent artists who are often overlooked by philanthropy. “The Creative Work Fund's 2007 awardees help to enhance the quality of life in the greater Bay Area in truly distinctive ways,” comments the Fund's director, Frances Phillips. “By working with local nonprofits to address critical needs and by bringing the arts to new audiences, our awardees make very real and lasting contributions to their communities.” The Creative Work Fund's 2007 traditional arts awardees and their collaborators are:
To learn more about the Creative Work Fund, or read more about its 2007 grantees, visit the Creative Work Fund's website or call (415) 398-4474. ACTA Featured at the California Arts Council Meeting in Fresno
Philip Hagopian, Amy Kitchener, Richard Hagopian
One June 21, 2007, the California Arts Council (CAC) held its first council meeting in Fresno in over ten years. At the request of Chairman Michael Alexander, ACTA was invited to make a presentation in its role as one of the CAC’s Multicultural Statewide Service Networks. Amy Kitchener, ACTA’s Executive Director, discussed some of the critical issues facing the traditional folk arts field in California and presented Armenian oud players Richard and Philip Hagopian—recent participants in ACTA’s Apprenticeship Program. Kitchener emphasized how “ACTA’s Apprenticeship Program addresses one of our field’s greatest challenges—which is the transmission of orally passed skills and knowledge. Think about how someone learns how to make a Western Mono basket, play Armenian oud music, or learn classical Cambodian dance—it is through intensive study with a skilled practitioner. For the most part, the traditional folk arts are not institutionalized, but instead are rooted in communities and live and evolve as part of the cultural lifeways of a group of people. The Apprenticeship Program pays master artists to train experienced apprentices in intensive one on one learning projects.” Kitchener introduced Richard Hagopian and his grandson, Phillip, to the CAC to share their traditional Armenian music. Richard was born near Fresno and is a virtuoso oud player and internationally recognized musician, including earning the NEA National Heritage Fellowship in 1989, the nation’s highest honor in the traditional arts. Last year, Richard and Philip participated in ACTA’s Apprenticeship Program, working intensively together over the course of a year to refine Philip’s fingering and picking techniques on oud and learning the modes and notes of Armenian music. Phillip Hagopian took an interest in the oud at the age of four and started to teach himself how to play. He’s also a very serious pianist and won local and regional honors in the Bach Festival championship and is advancing to the statewide category where he will compete in the fall. While there was only time for one piece, the Hagopians left everyone wanting for more. To hear a sample of Richard Hagopian’s music visit Smithsonian Folkways Recordings’ website. To learn more about ACTA’s Apprenticeship Program visit ACTA’s website. To learn more about the California Arts Council visit their website. San Diego Commission for Arts and Culture Announces San Diego FolklifeThe San Diego Commission for Arts and Culture has launched a new, web-based project called San Diego Folklife, which aims to provide resources for folk artists and education for those looking to learn more about folk arts. The site includes a portal, designed to encourage collaboration and conversation around folk art practice. For more information about San Diego Folklife, please contact the San Diego Commission for Arts and Culture via email or at (619) 533-3050 |
