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This week marked the official launch of the Roots of Music, a music education program founded by Derrick Tabb of the Rebirth Brass Band to serve middle-school students in New Orleans. Over 40 children have been attending afterschool band rehearsals, where they have been introduced to the fundamentals of music theory and marching band performance.

The support of Vic Firth, Evans Drums, and B’nai Israel Baton Rouge have allowed Roots of Music to begin with this pilot session. In June, the program will grow to 150 students and by the Fall we will be fully up and running as a daily afterschool program with 200 students in a dedicated facility. The program is free for all students.

Roots of Music is in need of instruments as well as donations to cover the costs of busing, facilities, and salaries for instructors Lawrence Rawlins and Shoan Ruffin. Contact Roots of Music at (504) 723-4666 or make donations at www.backbeatfoundation.org (please indicate Roots of Music on the PayPal form).

You can learn more about Roots of Music at:

www.lsu.edu/fweil/AfterSchoolMusicProgram.htm
www.therootsofmusic.com  read more »

This article, written by Chie Sakakibara and Aaron Fox, is currently featured on the website of the Barrow Arctic Science Consortium (BASC). BASC is helping to support Aaron Fox and Chie Sakakibara in their research in the North Slope of Alaska. The article includes historical photos as well as photos from Aaron and Chie's recent research trip to Barrow, Alaska.

Further press about the project has been published in The Arctic Sounder (download the pdf). The project has also been mentioned in the "Alaska Newsreader" section of the Anchorage Daily News -- check it out here.

Click on the photo to see a large image of a photo taken by Laura Boulton during November, 1946 of the singers she recorded in Barrow, Alaska. From left to right, the identified singers in the photograph are: Leo Kaleak (seated left), Otis Ahkivgak (standing left), Willie Sielak, Guy Okakok, and Alfred Koonoalak. Not in the photo, but identified on the recordings, are three children: Mary (also known as "Eva") Ahvik, and Harold and Eddie Kagak (identified as "Eddie Orson" in Boulton's notes). Not in the photo, but prominently featured on the recordings, is singer Joe Sikvayugak (spelled "Sikvayunak" in Boulton's notes). This photo appears in two published locations. The version above is copied from Boulton's 1968 autobiography, now out of print, entitled The Music Hunter. A better-quality print was also published, but with extensive cropping, in the liner notes to Boulton's 1955 Folkways recording, now available from Smithsonian Global Sound, The Eskimos of Hudson Bay and Alaska.

If you are a member of the Point Barrow Iñupiat community and are looking for the website mentioned by Aaron Fox and Chie Sakakibara as heard on Earl Finkler's radio show on KBRW on Tuesday morning or at the community meeting at the Iñupiat Heritage Center on Tuesday evening, please click here for the website link.

A username and password are required to access the website. If you did not receive this information personally from Prof. Fox in Barrow, please write to him directly at aaf19@columbia.edu for the password.