This is the story of a shy young man who was given the first love flute long ago by the birds and animals. 

This young man was so shy it was easier for him to face enemy warriors in battle than speak to the girl he loved. Many other young men actively sought to speak with her, but for the most part she avoided them. The shy young man was very unhappy with himself, and resolved to leave the camp and people for awhile. He shot an arrow into the air with out thought or aim to establish a direction to wander. To his amazement the arrow stayed in the air pointing and leading him on at a pace that he could walk. All day he followed the arrow, and in the evening it fell to the ground near a stream of clear water. 

The next morning he again shot the arrow, and again it lead him onward, and again fell to the ground at a good camping spot in the early evening. By this time he knew something special was happening to him. He followed the arrow for a total of four days. On the fourth evening the young man lay down to sleep at the edge of an Aspen forest near a clear stream. He was very tired and sleepy, and who can say what followed was a dream or reality. 

There was a rustle of leaves, a click of hoof against stone, and he heard a voice whispering “Will you tell him?” and another voice answered “No, brother, we will both tell him!”. When he opened his eyes he saw two tall Elk Men, painted black and yellow all over and with great branching antlers standing over him. “We have come to help you win the love of your life.” one whispered, “We brought you this – It is a flute – Listen!” the other said. He blew into the end … 

The sound was so beautiful that all the animal people stopped what they were doing and listened, and the Aspen leaves trembled with gladness. “Woodpecker made this – You can see his likeness on the end.” The other Elk Man said “All the birds and animals have put their voices into this flute, and we Elk Men have done the same. With this flute you will speak straight to the heart of the girl you love. Practice with the flute on the way home, and the animal people will help you.” With this the Elk Men flashed their mirrors into his eyes, and when he could see again the Elk Men were gone and he saw two young bull elk running from his camp back into the trees. 

When he awoke the next morning the young man found the flute lying of a bed of sage. On his return trip the young man listened closely to the voices of the animals and birds, and learned how to make these sounds on the flute. Coyote helped him learn to make a yelping sound. Medowlark helped with his special sound, and Look did the same.  All the Warblers and Sparrows gave him their special songs, and listened to make sure that he got them right. He learned to weave these sounds together into his own songs, All the animal people approved, and joined him with their own songs.

On the evening of the fourth day he came close to the camp of his people, and as he played the flute the spirit of the breeze carried his song to the girl’s ear. She had always loved the shy young man, more then ever now as she realized what he had done and what he had learned to win her affections.

In the time before time there was a village of humans living beside a lake.  One of the families in this village was a man and a woman with one daughter. 

From the time she was very little this girl loved the lake and the beings that lived there.  Rather than playing with the other children, her parents would find her down at the lake.  Sometimes she would be helping the beaver family gather tender tree limbs to anchor below the water for tasty winter snacks.  Some times she would be chasing fish in the shallows with the otter pups.  Other times she would be sunning her self on the old log with the turtle family.  

This girl loved all the other water animal people, and they loved her in return.  The told her where the best fish would gather under the bank in the heat of the day so than she could tickle them out for the evening meal.  They told her where the best patch of wild rice was growing, so that her mother could easily fill the family storage baskets. 

But of all the animal people the girl loved the loon family the best.  She loved the way the parents danced on the water in the spring, and how the mother built a secluded nest on the floating weeds.  She loved how the little ones looked like the down of the cat tails floating on the water, and how they rode on the mother’s back when they tired of swimming on their own.  Most of all, the girl loved the loon’s voices – the gently undulating call they made to each other across the misty lake at dusk and dawn. 

One day the girl did not come home, and her parents searched for her with much alarm.  They feared that she had surprised mother bear while fishing, or that she had got caught under water helping beaver repair his lodge.  They looked for the girl for four days along the shores and on the islands.  They kept a big fire burning for four nights so that she could find her way home.  But she was gone.

The next spring a new loon family came to the lake and set up a home near the lodge of the mother and father.  In the evening the man and woman heard a different kind of loon song, and found that if they really concentrated, they could make out human words.  It was their daughter!  She had been changed into one of the loons she loved so much by First Woman as a special gift for being such a good friend of the water people. 

The next morning the father found a flute out side the door of the lodge, with a loon’s head on the end, and a small loon on the top, just the way the babies ride. As he picked up the flute and began to play, he could hear his daughter, returning his call from her nest near by. Thus the flute is a gift to humans from First Woman, and from that time on humans have been able to speak with the bird and animal people with the flute, if they try hard enough.

Once there was a young man, good looking, but very shy.  When he came of the age to be courting a wife he had difficulty approaching the young woman of his band.  One girl in particular he admired for she was graceful and modest, but she already had many suitors for her hand in marriage and the young man felt he had no chance of capturing her attention.

Now this young man’s parents had walked on, and he lived with his grand parents.  His grandmother noticed his attention to the young woman, and she tired of hearing his heavy sighs.  She told her husband to find something for the young man to do that would get him away from the village for awhile.

Grandfather told the young man that winter was coming, and some one needed to go hunting for a fat elk to provide smoked meat for the long winter months.  So the young man took his bow, and went to up the side of the mountain to where the elk people lived.  The first day out he saw a proud bull elk with large antlers but no matter how he stalked, the elk was always just out of bow shot and further around the mountain.  He tracked the elk for four days, and slept on the ground for four nights.

During the fourth night he heard a wonderful sound rising and falling on the night wind, and he thought about what it could possibly be.  In the morning he was gathering his things when he saw woodpecker working on a dead branch above his camp.  As he watched the wind rose, and he noticed the sound of the night before coming from the branch.  “Ah” he thought “The wind is moving through the holes that woodpecker has made! I wonder if my breath would work the same way?” Leaving a small gift of tobacco for the tree, he reached up and took the branch. After some trial he found that he could indeed cause the branch to make a pleasing sound. The young man returned to his village, and during the four days walking, he learned to play the branch by imitating the sounds of nature around him.  During the four nights of his cold camp he carved the likeness of the little bird that had made the first flute on the end of the branch.

The first night back in the village he went to a spot behind the young woman’s home, and played a song on the branch, but he was shy, and left before she could find him.  This happened for three nights, but on the fourth night he found the young woman waiting for him – She had fallen in love with the songs that he made for her. And so it happens that young men go to the mountain to make flutes, and learn to play them, so that the young women will know of their love.

Kent Bush                                        kent_bush@sundogflutes.com

Sun Dog Flute Works                                

15609 SE 10th Street                      

Bellevue, WA  98008                    425/591-1018

There are a number of stories and legends about the creation of the American Indian flute.  We have selected three of these and they are attached to this section.

The American Indian flute had both religious and secular uses, depending upon which American Indian culture in which it was found.  Not all American Indian cultures used a flute.  For example, none of the maritime cultures of the Pacific North West made and used flutes prior to the 20th century.  Other types of whistles (such as a free reed, and a single chambered ducted whistle) appear to have been known and used in the Pacific Northwest, but not the double chambered instrument we are familiar with.

Flutes were used as part of organized religious ceremonies among the Pueblo farmers in the desert southwest, but did not appear to have a secular use with those people.  The Apache used a whistle in some of their ceremonies to send messages to the spirit world. In recent years that whistle seems to have been largely replaced with the more typical style flute that we know today, and a secular use has developed.  Among the Plains tribes the flute appears to be mostly a secular instrument, used for personal enjoyment and courting.  Early historic accounts from the South East and North East mention the flute as being part of both religious and secular life at the time of contact.

Materials used in the manufacture of flutes also varied widely.  Many of the woodland groups seemed to prefer aromatic red cedar, but also used a wide range of other native woods.  The use of river cane was common in the latitudes were this plant is found, from east to west coasts.  Fired ceramic whistles and flutes are known from Mexico.  Historically the Hopi have made a river cane flute with a gourd used like a trumpet bell on the end.  Along the California coast the Chumash made a very specialized flute out of deer ulna bone, sealed with native asphalt and decorated with shell beads, in addition to the river cane flute common to the area.  The Nez Perce preferred elderberry, and some of the Great Lakes tribes used sumac.  Both of these are plants with long, straight stems that have pithy centers, which is deal for making flutes.  The people living along both slopes of the Rocky Mountains used mostly juniper.  The High Plains cultures used a wide range of native woods, including willow and cottonwood and osage orange.

We have a few tantalizing glimpses of how flutes were used in pre-contact America, however some of the early written records for the South East mention both men and woman playing flutes during welcoming cermonies Women used whistles during several of the dance ceremonies along the Northern California Coast, and women also played flutes in private for personal enjoyment among many of the Eastern Woodland and Oklahoma cultures. Across most of the Americas the written record is pretty scanty regarding flute use. The current prohibitions in many cultures over women playing flutes seems to have develope during the reservation perion (1880 – present), and the motivation for this is not entirely clear.

In an interview, Doc Payne (generally recognized as being a primary leader in the current flute renascence) mentioned that “… many native women are very uncomfortable being in a place containing so many flutes …” referring to the room housing his private collection.  When asked recently about women playing flutes a Nez Perce man responded: “Well, there are flute players, and flute listeners, and among the Nimiipuu women are the flute listeners.”  However having said this, he also recognized that one of the three people currently working to bring back the flute among the Nez Perce is a young woman.

Whenever these restrictions took place, and for what ever reasons, These prohibitions are breaking down with the renascence of the American Indian flute. Native women such as Mary Youngblood and Hovia Edwards have become flute advocates and performers of the first order.  Those of us that are active in flute circles also recognize that at least 50% of the membership and attendees are female.

Renascence of the American Indian Flute

This fantastic musical instrument was almost lost to us!  And in fact, much of the “culture of the flute” (the different meanings the flute might have had, and how it was used in the society) has been lost to many American Indian peoples.  There were probably several reasons for this.

It has been estimated that between one half and two thirds of the American Indian population was decimated by disease in the first few years following prolonged contact with European settlers [an excellent discussion of the reasons for this may be found in the book Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond].  To put this into context, every other person, or two people out of three, would be taken by disease in a very short period of time, and most likely older people – the care givers and the culture teachers – would be some of the first to go.  As a result the transfer of knowledge of how to make and play flutes and the use of them in an orderly society, was largely lost to any given group in a very short period of time. [Note: There is no indication in the historic record that disease was spread by intent.  It was not until the 1870’s that Dr, Robert Koch postulated a sequence of steps for directly relating a specific microbe to a specific disease, and the 20th century had come by the time these theories were commonly accepted.]

Flutes by their nature are generally fairly small and fragile items, which in most societies are considered very personal property.  It is likely that many were buried with their maker/owners, and it is likely many more were lost or destroyed in the troubled times following contact with the advancing European based culture.  You have to question how many flutes made the long walk with the Cherokee from Tennessee to Oklahoma, or how many flutes survived the attack of Black Kettle’s Cheyenne at Sand Creek, or how many flutes were captured with the Nez Perce at Big Hole and taken to Vancouver Barracks – Probably not very many.  Flutes came out pretty low on the “need to take it” list when packing for basic survival, which was a scenario faced by native people on a fairly consistent basis for a lot of years.

Native flutes also sounded different to the ears of Europeans.  They were generally in a pentatonic minor scale, thus not useable for most European music of the period, and the native users did not follow European musical conventions in their compositions.  Indigenous flutes were individually tuned to the maker’s wishes, and the resulting music was often discordant to European ears.  Because flutes were used in courtship, and in native ceremonies, many superstitious Europeans thought them to be “pagan” and “evil”.  As a result, the use of flutes for any reason was strongly discouraged by European missionaries, Indian Agents and teachers in boarding schools.

As a result of these factors, the native flute went into a period of decline, preserved by only a very few flute makers and players through the last decades of the nineteenth  century, and the first half of the twentieth.

Kokopeli

Kokopeli is the primary fertility spirit among the Hopi Indians of Northern Arizona.  Kokopeli comes as both male and female entities, although the male personalization is the most dramatic for anyone who has seen the dances where he appears.  While he is often depicted as having a hunched back, the Hopi do not depict him playing a flute.  Who, then, is that mysterious figure portrayed in Southwestern rock art, depicted with a hunched back, strange hair cut, and playing a flute?

While we modern followers of the American Indian flute often refer to this figure as “Kokopeli”, we really don’t know who or what this figure is intended to portray.  There is some evidence to suggest that he is a peddler (the hunch back actually being a pack) wearing a distinctive style headdress, and playing a flute to announce his presence.  He is sometimes portrayed with a woman companion, sometimes dancing, and in many cases involved in life regenerating activities. It is doubtful that we will ever really know for sure, and while the designation may bother the Hopi a little, this figure will probably be continue to be known as “Kokopeli” for a long time.  Whoever he represents, this memorable, energetic little figure well represents the modern spirit of the American Indian flute!

Is the American Indian Flute a “Sacred” Instrument?

Our flute has many personalities – It can morn like a loon, it can bugle like an elk, it can trill like a warbler.  It has many moods – Expectant for the sunrise, happy when calling the bubbling brook, complacent in the dusk at works end, and seductive when calling a lover.  For a comparatively simple musical instrument, the flute is may things, and can represent these images and moods to those who play, and those who listen.  I suppose that it might be easy to represent such an instrument, capable of all these things, as “sacred”.

However, to me this is simplistic.  The flute is nothing more or less than a piece of wood, or a piece of reed, with holes bored into it.  You can paint it, decorate it, tie feathers or beads to it, and it is still a stick with holes.  It is not until a human picks that stick up, and blows air into it that it become something else – It becomes what ever that human wants it to become, and the sound is a representation of part of that human’s soul.

So to me, the flute is not “sacred” any more than a trumpet or an organ is sacred.  The flute is simply a tool that allows humans to communicate thoughts to one another.  While some of those thoughts may be sacred in nature, the flute is simply a stick with holes.

You should keep all finished wood, particularly wooden musical instruments, out of the direct sunlight.  Direct sunlight coming through the house or car window can result in rapid and unequal expansion and contraction of both the wood and the finish on it, and cause cracks developing in both wood and finish.  Cracks in the finish provide additional points of entry for moisture, which causes more expansion and contraction.  Also the ultra violet rays in un-filtered sunlight will cause deterioration of surface finishes.

Heat and moisture (temperature and humidity) also cause rapid expansion of the wood, and the finish.  Human salvia is quite acidic, and will cause a breakdown of most surface finishes.  For this reason we suggest that you simply place the end of your flute against your lips when playing, rather than putting it in your mouth – The surface finish will last longer.

However the surface finish will eventually wear off of the mouth piece and over the finger holes of your flute.  You may notice the wood grain rising on the mouth piece in particular.  You can fix this by buffing the area with a little bit of #0000 steel wool, followed by an application of bee’s wax.  You may also return the flute to our shop for refinishing.  While there is no charge for the work, we will need to recover shipping costs.

Remember also that there is both moisture and heat in our breath.  This may become condensed in the slow air chamber of the flute, sometimes to the extent that the moisture affects the sound of the flute.  This is called “wetting out” and may be cured in many cases by pulling the block back to expose the hole leading from the slow air chamber, turning the flute upside down, and blowing sharply.  This should remove enough moisture from the slow air chamber so that you are able to continue playing.  Clearing the slow air chamber is also a good practice to follow whenever putting the flute away after playing.

Your flute is a fairly delicate instrument that requires at least some degree of care in transportation, handling, playing and storage.  We warranty defects in manufacture and will return purchase price for return of product for this reason with no question as long as there is no sign of abuse or mechanical damage.  We will also refinish and attempt repair of damaged flutes for the cost of shipping, plus a reasonable and agreed upon amount for repairs to damaged flutes.

Craftsmanship

Many of our flutes are made from salvaged wood, or wood from small mills that specialize in the harvesting of old trees that need to be removed for various reasons.  Some wood comes as “left over” from friends who are cabinet makers, or who are  remodeling historic buildings.  Most of the hardwood we use comes from similar sources in the Hawaiian Islands.

We have a small shop, and only a limited number of flutes are available at any given time.  We do not have the tools necessary to make the larger bore, lower key flutes, so we concentrate on the mid-range (7/8 to 1 inch) and higher (½ to ¾ inch) keys.

Each flute is hand crafted, so no two are exactly alike.  The woods used in making the various components are unique to each flute.  As a result, each flute, even though made from pieces of wood from the same trees, will have subtle differences in tone.

The flue block (also called the “totem” or “bird” or “saddle”) is mated to the individual instrument when the flute is first given voice.  Most blocks will interchange within a common bore dimension (in other words, the block from a 1 inch bore flute will generally fit our other 1 inch bore flutes, but may not fit one of our flutes with 1/2 inch bore).  We produce a limited range of flue block styles, mostly reflecting the traditional American Indian bird, animal and simple “saddle” shapes.  We are also aware that many people like to personalize their flute with a distinctive block, and we are happy to work with any one who has a special design in mind.

All wooden components are finished in their natural color – No stain or paint is used unless specifically ordered.  Flaws in the wood (whether natural or due to previous use) may be filled with contrasting materials (wood, stone, shell, acrylic chips) which are then sealed and finished.  These repairs serve to highlight the individual character of the flute.

Both interior and exterior surfaces are sanded and sealed.  The interiors are sealed with a cyanoacrylate based finish.  The exterior surfaces first sealed with a sanding sealer prior to the final sanding, followed by a coat of the cyanoacrylate based finish.  Finely the exteriors are buffed and waxed.  While the both sanding sealer and finish have volatile drying agents, this dissipates as the sealer and finish dry.  All the products used in the manufacture of the flute are safe to put against your lips and mouth in their finished state.