Douglas Spotted Eagle
Encyclopedia
Douglas Spotted Eagle, is a Grammy-winning musician, noted for his live and recorded performances on the traditional Native American flute, sometimes accompanied by either traditional Navajo
(Diné) singers and instrumentalists or a modern band. He is listed in The Native American Almanac as a flutist who does traditional and new age music, and in World Music By Richard Nidel as a flutist and film composer "who incorporates synthesizers into Native sounds." He is also a lecturer and publisher of instructional books and DVDs for music and video computer software.
, new age
, pop
, and world beat
with Native American music
. Spotted Eagle received a Grammy Award for his production of Gathering of Nations Powwow, and along with numerous collaborations has released 13 albums under his own name. He was raised in Valley Junction
, Iowa
, and has been building flutes since he was 12 years old, and he performed traditional music as well as being a guitarist for a popular rock and roll
band after his family moved to Salt Lake City, Utah
. He was married to a Diné
woman from Bluff, Arizona. Spotted Eagle lives in Utah
and works in support of youth anti-drug causes as well as being involved in the prevention of child abuse. He has been heavily involved in the Children's Justice Center as a fundraiser. He also teaches filmmaking to aspiring Native filmmakers. His recording include Canyon Speak Closer to Far Away', 'PRAY', Legend of the Flute Boy and Sacred Feelings.
site location hearings in Montana
, Denver, and Washington D.C..
Navajo people
The Navajo of the Southwestern United States are the largest single federally recognized tribe of the United States of America. The Navajo Nation has 300,048 enrolled tribal members. The Navajo Nation constitutes an independent governmental body which manages the Navajo Indian reservation in the...
(Diné) singers and instrumentalists or a modern band. He is listed in The Native American Almanac as a flutist who does traditional and new age music, and in World Music By Richard Nidel as a flutist and film composer "who incorporates synthesizers into Native sounds." He is also a lecturer and publisher of instructional books and DVDs for music and video computer software.
Music career
Many call his music "modern ethnic", as it mixes jazzJazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
, new age
New Age
The New Age movement is a Western spiritual movement that developed in the second half of the 20th century. Its central precepts have been described as "drawing on both Eastern and Western spiritual and metaphysical traditions and then infusing them with influences from self-help and motivational...
, pop
Pop music
Pop music is usually understood to be commercially recorded music, often oriented toward a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short, simple songs utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes.- Definitions :David Hatch and Stephen Millward define pop...
, and world beat
World music
World music is a term with widely varying definitions, often encompassing music which is primarily identified as another genre. This is evidenced by world music definitions such as "all of the music in the world" or "somebody else's local music"...
with Native American music
Native American music
American Indian music is the music that is used, created or performed by Native North Americans, specifically traditional tribal music. In addition to the traditional music of the Native American groups, there now exist pan-tribal and inter-tribal genres as well as distinct Indian subgenres of...
. Spotted Eagle received a Grammy Award for his production of Gathering of Nations Powwow, and along with numerous collaborations has released 13 albums under his own name. He was raised in Valley Junction
West Des Moines, Iowa
West Des Moines is a city in Polk, Dallas, and Warren counties in the U.S. state of Iowa. As of the 2000 census, the city population was 46,403; a special census taken in the spring of 2005 counted 51,744 residents and the United States Census Bureau estimated that 53,889 residents lived there in...
, Iowa
Iowa
Iowa is a state located in the Midwestern United States, an area often referred to as the "American Heartland". It derives its name from the Ioway people, one of the many American Indian tribes that occupied the state at the time of European exploration. Iowa was a part of the French colony of New...
, and has been building flutes since he was 12 years old, and he performed traditional music as well as being a guitarist for a popular rock and roll
Rock and roll
Rock and roll is a genre of popular music that originated and evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s, primarily from a combination of African American blues, country, jazz, and gospel music...
band after his family moved to Salt Lake City, Utah
Utah
Utah is a state in the Western United States. It was the 45th state to join the Union, on January 4, 1896. Approximately 80% of Utah's 2,763,885 people live along the Wasatch Front, centering on Salt Lake City. This leaves vast expanses of the state nearly uninhabited, making the population the...
. He was married to a Diné
Navajo people
The Navajo of the Southwestern United States are the largest single federally recognized tribe of the United States of America. The Navajo Nation has 300,048 enrolled tribal members. The Navajo Nation constitutes an independent governmental body which manages the Navajo Indian reservation in the...
woman from Bluff, Arizona. Spotted Eagle lives in Utah
Utah
Utah is a state in the Western United States. It was the 45th state to join the Union, on January 4, 1896. Approximately 80% of Utah's 2,763,885 people live along the Wasatch Front, centering on Salt Lake City. This leaves vast expanses of the state nearly uninhabited, making the population the...
and works in support of youth anti-drug causes as well as being involved in the prevention of child abuse. He has been heavily involved in the Children's Justice Center as a fundraiser. He also teaches filmmaking to aspiring Native filmmakers. His recording include Canyon Speak Closer to Far Away', 'PRAY', Legend of the Flute Boy and Sacred Feelings.
Video production and software
Spotted Eagle is also involved in the field of video production and regularly writes articles for Videography, Studio, DMN, Creative COW, other magazines, and VASST, and tours doing training for Adobe, Apple, Sony Media Software. His interests outside of music and video production appear to include skydiving. Douglas was nearly killed in a skydiving accident when he made a piloting error. His music is featured and he is a producer of Sundance Media Group's 2002 video The Way of the Pow-Wow.Background
He is not an enrolled member of any tribe, yet grew up with both Lakota and Navajo families, the former of which gave him his name when he was 14 or 16. He does not claim tribal membership, but has several Lakota and Navajo family members on his Facebook page that call him "brother." His adoption into and of Native American culture as well as his use of a Native American name have come under scrutiny by some Native American groups that attempt to stop non-Native American people from creating products or performing for money while claiming to be Native American. He participated in the Sand Creek MassacreSand Creek Massacre
As conflict between Indians and white settlers and soldiers in Colorado continued, many of the Cheyenne and Arapaho, including bands under Cheyenne chiefs Black Kettle and White Antelope, were resigned to negotiate peace. The chiefs had sought to maintain peace in spite of pressures from whites...
site location hearings in Montana
Montana
Montana is a state in the Western United States. The western third of Montana contains numerous mountain ranges. Smaller, "island ranges" are found in the central third of the state, for a total of 77 named ranges of the Rocky Mountains. This geographical fact is reflected in the state's name,...
, Denver, and Washington D.C..
Discography
- 1990 - Sacred Feelings (SOAR)
- 1991 - CanyonSpeak (SOAR; reissued 2000)
- 1991 - Legend of the Flute Boy (SOAR; reissued 2007)
- 1992 - Stand at the Center (Natural Visions NV101)
- 1993 - Human Rites (Natural Visions NV102)
- 1994 - Ultimate Collection (Natural Visions/NV103)
- 1994 - Common Ground (Natural Visions/NV106)
- 1995 - Between Father Sky and Mother Earth by Various Artists
- 1996 - Closer to far Away (Windham Hill/BMG)
- 1997 - Tenaya: Ode to Yosemite (Natural Visions/NV120)
- 1998 - Pray (Higher Octave)
- 1999 - Voices
Books
- Spotted Eagle, Douglas (1997). Voices of Native America. Illustrated by Ralph L. Smith. Eagle's View Pub., ISBN 0943604567. ISBN 9780943604565120.
External links
- Douglas Spotted Eagle's Website
- [ Allmusic page]
- Biography
- Article