Best Round Dance Singers

[nimihtotan]

the topic here is simple the best round dance singers you know and love!!!!
(and ya know theyre gonna be Cree!) LOL


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[The Rock]

yep I'll agree with you there......I'd have to give it to Red Bull.....love their beat

some close seconds though are Whitefish Jr.'s (Harvey can make any lead a thing of beaty), Northern Cree (nice beat, good songs) and Wildhorse (you gotta see it to believe it)......

[hoksila]

I don't think that every good group that sings round dance songs are cree. Think about it, Black Lodge isn't cree, and their beat is tight, and their songs, well they weren't that great at Schemitzun this year, but their past songs have changed the way most singers compose songs now. Like that Pepsi song. It's funny but true. Eyabay isn't cree, and they sound pretty good. And what's the deal with you thinking cree groups are the only good groups out there. Expand your mind a little and you'll see others do exist besides cree. Talk about loving your tribe. I'm proud to be Ojibway but I don't think that all the good groups are Ojib.

AHO.
Miigwetch!

[fancyshamancy]

I have to agree with you "Rock", Harvey has one of the prettiest leads. I know that a couple of his nephews also have a lead almost just as good as his. I went to my first round dance this past winter up in Canada, and was it ever kewl. It seemed like as if all those that were singing had excellent leads. My boyfriend said that all those guys up there have really good voices, but choose to only sing round dances and ceremonies, and choose not to powwow. Pretty kewl, I thought.

[kahkakew]

Tansi Nimotohtan?

Kahkakew ni si kason!

The Nahkeywino (Ojibwe) is way off....if you are only talking about recorded singers..then maybe whitefish and red bull are good, but go to a real round dance or tea dance and listen to all the lead singers who are asked to sing..feel the beat and vibration of their drum as it hits you when you dance and you will be amazed. Most if not all of the great singers will never record anything as that is not their way or intention..my late dad was considered to be the last of his kind when it came to making certain medicines, songs, pipe making and drum making....his songs had ancient origins. not the contemp ones you buy at a pow-wow, little wonder that Edmund Bull and other drums came to him and asked to buy the rights to his songs over the years. "I have been everywhere" has many of my late dad's songs on it!
Round dance is ours, it is so much older than the old form of pow-wow, it is a healing ceremony and there still are men who own certain songs meant for healing at these dances, they will never record their songs, so unless you have grown up with it and been to several hundreds of them and watched young and old singers come and go and saw how many incredible Cree singers there were and are....it is a no contest..sure Black Lodge can sing well, anyone can after years of imitating another tirbes ways, but they cannot do it as well and probobly never will, maybe they will win a contemp contest here and there, but their songs will never match up to the hundreds of singers at the hundreds of round dances each fall and wither in Cree country... you have to experience to really have an opinion based on knowledge instead of judgement..
CHE NIMOTOHTAN?

Kahkakew

[The Rock]

Kahkakew....do you ALWAYS assume you're the only one that goes to round dances????

COME ON MAN!!!!!

Get off that wooden horse and join the rest of us skins in the real world and tell us who your favorites are.....and don't give us that "Well it doesn't matter as long as their from Alberta" run around answer as well. If you're a singer and you know so much about it then joining in a friendly discussion about who your favorites are shouldn't have to be that much of an issue.

Back on topic....

forgot to add one more to my list.....

Blackstone.....they make some cho songs!! (And sing a lot of good old ones as well)

[nimihtotan]

i gots to agree with kakahkew with this one....the better round dance singers in Indian country are Cree, all others like Blacklodge who do have some nice songs, or Eyabay, they just did not grow up with roundance like most of the singers in alberta, sask.,What i am saying is that the Cree people have more experience when it comes to round dance singing, and it shows. Just look at Northern Cree, Clayton Chief (Little Island Cree), Mosquito Singers, Edmund Bull(Red Bull), Harvey Dreaver and the list goes on and on......

[kahkakew]

Well taksis here is my list!

My late dad, Andrew Abraham was truly great, late Victor Thunderchild was one of the all time greats, the late John Tootoosis, Melvin Stone, all the others mentioned, Vern Chocan is still pretty good as are my two relations Jack Bull and Francis Green of Hobbema, not to mention myself once in awhile...CHAA!
I like listening to Geogre Cardinal of Saddle lake, the McGilvary boys, Norman Berard from Buffalo lake is good, another George Cardinal also of Buffalo Lake who hardly ever sings is still great...most of these mens names are obscure because they hardly sing any more and if they do it is not at round dances...they sing the old old ones I grew up on..today I do not know the young ones as I live in another province and rarely do I get back home.
Eugene Cardinal of Kehewin is good as are his boys....late Mosom Kanipetatew of Onion Lake sang the oldest songs I ever heard..they are beautiful songs.
So my list may not be one chalk full of all the great contemp round dance singers, but I am happier listening to them than any groups latest renditions, especially if it is a non-cree group tryiing to make some $$$ by imitating our style of singing. Of course I like everyone else like Red bull, Whitefish Jr's, Mosquitoe, Little island cree, etc. pretty well any Cree group is bound to be one of my favorites.
Hope you are satisfied with my list?

Kahkakew

[kahkakew]

Nah Asnee Piyak! What do oyu th8ink of my list? is it contemp enough for you?
I am dying to know!
Nah Nimihtohtan, Kinistoyamaw kakiyaw napewak che?

Kahkakew

[The Rock]

After reading the names.....it explains a lot.....


Should I get a wheelbarrow for your head?? Little heavy is it????