Bo Taylor

Partial Transcript: My name is Bo Taylor. I’m director here at the Museum of the Cherokee Indian. I’m—I live in the Big Cove Community. I’ve done a lot of diverse things but culture’s always been the one thing that’s kind of brought me back. I’m one of the Warriors so we go out—Warriors of AniKituhwa. We go out and do presentations promoting our culture. And we use—and our vehicle is usually song and dance. We, you know, we educate people about who we—who the Cherokees were and who we still are. And one thing I’ve always said—I work at a museum and museums are often set aside for things that are dead and gone but we’re still here. Our culture is still alive. It’s still a vibrant, rich culture and I’m proud that I’m a part of it

Partial Transcript: Well, you know, I grew up in a time when things weren’t really important. The cultural part of it. It was like it was often put on the back burner. I kind of believe that the culture was in decline for some time and that’s the thing. It was all about progress. Promoting and progressing our people through taking up education and, you know, which I’m a full believer in that. But the fact is, if you don’t take your culture with you then you’re kind of lost. And that’s kind of the thing that was—for me—I was very active when I was younger—playing football, I wrestled, I was always involved in some kind of sport or whatever. But when I got out of high school—I mean, I wasn’t big enough to play college ball or anything like that so I was kind of lost. I didn’t have anything.

And I remember I almost joined the Army and—but one thing that kind of brought me back was the pow-wow. I started—there was a pow-wow movement going on in Cherokee and a lot of people were dancing. And I remember when I was little I used to do some of the pow-wow dances and that’s not something that belongs to us. But I got all into that and I traveled and done a lot of things and paid my school by pow-wowing and doing—and it was fun. But it still wasn’t totally fulfilling for me—still love it. But when I got to know who I was as a Cherokee and then we had our own songs, we had our own dances and really that’s the one thing that was my saving grace and that kind of steered my life to a place where I’ve done and seen. I’ve experienced so many things. I’ve been blessed to be able to be among some influential people and they’ve taught me. And it’s like now that I can give back to the culture, I think it’s kind of a full circle thing. But the vehicle for me to do that has always been song and dance so that’s why I kind of love it.

Partial Transcript: A lot of people believe that you know, it’s hard for them to understand. Because sometimes as Native people, we’re kind of—we’re forgotten about. We’ve been here since people got off the boat. We’ve been here for at least—we can document at least 13,000 years. We say we’ve always been here. That’s one of our beliefs and each year they keep pushing back how much further they can document us being here. So we’ve been around. We’ve seen all the changes. We’ve—as Cherokees we shouldn’t be here but we still are. And that’s the thing—it’s like, we have been witness to our culture being invaded and—one reason that we’re still here is because we’ve been able to adapt and change.

We’ve been able to kind of ride out the storm. We’ve dealt with smallpox, we’ve dealt with war, we’ve dealt with a lot of different things. And part of it’s been because of our humor and the way our viewpoint of the world and—music and dance has also been one of those things that’s been kind of—the traditions have been carried. And it’s like—and when the Europeans come in, we did not see them as a threat. We didn’t know that they were—like the stars in the sky, we didn’t know that—the influence that they had. And so when they came, for us to say—somebody wanted to live somewhere—sure. That’s—anybody’s God-given right to be able to live and to provide for oneself. But how do you own the water? How do you own—? And to take and—that’s kind of a different philosophy.

Our philosophy was very spiritual. It wasn’t very—it wasn’t—so we didn’t—sometimes that didn’t always mesh—with the Scotch. They’re very clannish. They are somewhat like us and they understand a clan mentality. So we got along with them and especially because they were dealing with their own issues with the British. So it’s—for us, it’s been a—it’s a constant turbulent time for us. And right now, as Cherokees, we’re still trying to let people know we’re still here. But we are still sharing our culture and we’re still, you know. But the biggest thing is that our kids are learning it and picking it up. So that’s what’s—that’s our big hope.

Partial Transcript: Okay. Well, then—to the Cherokee, we are very communal and we have a very spiritual center. So the Creator is always at the center of things, then it’s our family, then it’s our clan, then it’s our tribe. And then to be an American. We’re Americans today but we often have a different mindset than a lot of people because we still have that communal tie. And a big part of that has always been with song and dance. It’s kind of one of the things that helped us—they talk about—when people would come to the Cherokees and they would come and visit all the Cherokees needed was a reason to sing and dance and have—and welcome people. And there was no cable television or anything like that back in the day. So that’s what they did—they would tell stories and they would, you know, and to get up and act out things from nature. And those are the things that kind of kept us together.

Our songs and dances have—they’re kind of—there’s several things that are happening, like a bear dance. It’s—we’re honoring the bear for what it does for us. But it also is a—it’s a way of bringing people together and creating bonds. And it’s a—if you’re kind of sweet on somebody you’d find somebody—a partner that you want to dance with and it’s a courting dance. And so—but it’s got a lot of humor in it. That’s one thing that people, when they think of Cherokees when they think of Native Americans, they think we’re all stoic and angry and always want to fight and kill people. That’s not—that’s not a Cherokee. That’s not a Native way.

The reason that we end up having to fight is because we were forced to that. And the songs have always been our way of expressing ourselves. And it’s been—I love our songs. I love them. It’s like—

Partial Transcript: How do you say that’s my favorite child? You can’t. And it’s like I have certain songs that I—I love the friendship dance. I love the mix dance. The mix dance is—it’s an awesome dance because it’s a dance that you can kind of customize. You can make it your own. You can sing about whatever you want. You can change the songs and change the order in it and kind of create your own rhythm—your own expression. But it also—the mix dance is often called a stomp dance. Because in Oklahoma what they do is they have this thing called stomp dance and they go—I mean, it was born back in the 1800s, late 1800s. And there was a decline in Cherokee spirituality and there was a guy named Redbird Smith who—he was trying to cultivate that and bring it back together. And so what they—and it was kind of outlawed to be there to do that.

So they went out into the woods and it kind of became kind of a hidden society. But see, from what I know is that dance has been done forever as a mix dance and they would do all these all-night dances when people come—visitors to the Cherokees. It’s the same dance. And different leaders would come in. And there’s a symbiotic relationship that’s happening. The men and women—the women provide the rhythm. They wear the leg rattles on their legs and they make like—it sounds like a train, chukka, chukka, chukka, chukka, chukka, chukka. And they provide the rhythm—the Dok-shi, the turtle. If you look on their backs—the turtle’s backs, you’ll see women.

We have a turtle in our main storage and it’s a beautiful turtle. It’s not that big but it’s got a cross on it. It’s got a little dot in the middle of it. If you look at some of the—you’ll see a cross and a flame and that’s represented by a cross and a little dot. And also you’ll see the women that look like they’re women wearing dresses, circling that thing. And that’s what they always say, the turtles belong to the women. So men don’t usually wear turtle shells. But the men would sing and they would sing these songs but that’s where the symbiosis comes together—where they—there’s a balance.

In this day in age men and women—the roles are—they are not clearly defined. A woman can be a doctor, a lawyer, a policeman, whatever, soldier even. But in our society back in the day there was just clearly defined roles. And I know that might sound sexist or whatever but a man cannot bear children. As much as we think we want to, I know I don’t want to. We can’t. It’s something only women can do and it’s something that—as men, we recognize that. And so when we will do a—in our daily activities and the way that we lived our lives, we honored women. And part of that was letting them provide that rhythm. And so when they would do these dances and they would sing—it’s all in the intention. Some of the dances, they were made pure for fun. You could joke and kid around. But there’s—you could use those same songs and those songs could be very spiritual. You could be singing to the creator.

You could be—the intention is having a fire. I’m a Methodist. I go to the United Methodist Church and we always light a candle. There’s always a candle burning. I finally asked somebody, why you got that—why do we have that candle? What it’s saying is it’s saying that the holy spirit is among us. It’s representing the holy spirit. And to me, that’s the thing with that fire. Fire is representative of the Creator being amongst us. And that’s why the intention’s there. So when you’re doing the dance and it can become purely spiritual or you can do the dance and it could be purely fun and communal. And so that’s where—that’s probably my favorite dance because it’s just fun and you can—it’s so awesome and you can get everybody working together. Because everybody sings in unison—there’s a call and response.

In the African tradition you’ll—they have a call and response, la la la lee, la la lee and they’ll do this back and forth. It’s the same thing. Iyo helena yo, helena, iyo helena, yo helena, ohio helena, yo helena, iyo helenada, yo helena. And there’s—and when you get those shells going and the music’s right it becomes magical. And that’s why I just—I love our music. I love who we are as Cherokees—as Gadus.

Partial Transcript: It does. There are—a lot of the dances they would do was in the Fall time—it’s because they tend to have more time. Because fields have been cleared and they had a little bit of extra time to—they didn’t have to work so hard so they would—. A lot of times they were doing these dances in the fall. But throughout the year they would be doing certain dances, a corn dance or the Eagle Dance. You’re not supposed to do that until the first frost. Because what they was saying was it brought on winter. And so there were certain things you weren’t supposed to do.

But today it’s like we’ve been able to do—the dances have changed. The dances have kind of been kept alive because of the show. We’ve been able to showcase who we are as people by expressing—with our dances and stuff—the hula dance. Back in the day, I guess for _______(???) it was—but now they’re at luaus and they’re selling little dolls and doing the hula. And I’m pretty sure that’s not exactly what it was meant for. But one thing that’s done is helped progress. The art is still done because they’re doing that. And so we are able to—I have a CD and I did catch a little flack for making a CD and selling it. But when I was a younger man I was growing up and there was—there were five people who I knew that could sing the songs.



And all of them—of all those five I don’t think all of them knew all of them. There’s—I’d probably say there’s two that knew the dances pretty full. One of them was Walker Calhoun, who I was able to learn from and who I spent my—I consider him to be my mentor. But when I brought this CD out people started learning it and I started—I learned some songs from the wax cylinders. They were collected back in the thirties and so I was learning these and I remember I was able to even teach Walker a couple of songs off of that, which was real neat. But the thing about it is now—and with the Warriors and there’s been kind of a renaissance. People are learning these songs again. There’s probably twenty-five people now that could probably sing the songs, which—in the scheme of things is a great thing. When you feel like our cultures are being progressed—and heck, there’s probably more that will learn the songs.

And that’s the thing. It’s like—my goal was not to try to make money or to make myself bigger. My goal was to say, hey, it’s important that we teach these. The name of my CD was called Rebuilding the Fire and that’s symbolic. And the Cherokees have always been—the fire’s been the center of who we are. And so when we rebuild that and become who we’re supposed to be—we are supposed to sing these songs. We are supposed to do these dances. We are supposed to be not ashamed or have to hide. And that’s why it’s like—for me it’s like—I feel like I’ve left the culture better than when I found it. And so—and now that I work at the museum I feel like this is a good place for me to progress it even further.

Partial Transcript: Well, you know—as Cherokees we had our own songs that correlate with doing work and the corn dance. They’re symbolically picking up corn. The women are holding out their aprons and they’re throwing the corn in there. And that is a good example of that. We’re—but as Cherokees we—it wasn’t always about the work. I mean, it doesn’t say that we didn’t work hard or whatever. But we didn’t—it wasn’t like we were on the chain gang singing these songs or anything. And really, I don’t know—I don’t know—I’d love to talk to some of the older ones and I’ve never even asked that question. But I don’t see why they wouldn’t have. But as for me—I’m not exactly sure.

Partial Transcript: Well, you know—to say that—I think it’s foolish to say that—you don’t go into a place and not take on some aspects of the place. It’s—that is ludicrous because the fact is, we live here in the mountains. It’s a different lifestyle. Just for example, if you go out west they talk about the—their mythology talks about—they talk about tornadoes, and their mythology’s built around the plants. We have mountains and merlin thickets and all that and clean flowing water and our mythology’s different. And so—and that’s kind of reflected in our dances and how we do things. And when the Europeans came in—to say that they didn’t take or adopt from us, they would learn to grow our food, they would learn to live like we did, they would learn to hunt like we did. They would learn the plants that we were using.

What’s sad is to say, hey, they made it. And then a few years goes by and it becomes theirs. And it’s not about ownership. I’m not trying to do that but to say that—well, you don’t get influenced by that—that’s crazy. And for—one of the—there was a gentleman, Joe Sam Queen and we were dancing. And we’re doing the friendship dance and part of it’s that coiling up. That coiling up like a snake and they come back out of it. It’s symbolic there. And then he goes, “We do that all the time.” And to say, hey—Cherokees were picking their stuff up too. It wasn’t just a one-way street. It was a constant flow. We were learning your instruments. The Cherokees were learning the fiddle and they were learning the hymn, shake note singing. We were able to adapt and to change, but it goes both ways.

So we were picking up stuff. I don’t know—I can’t—I don’t know how anybody could ever say that they were never influenced by Cherokee and their music. I just don’t get it. And it’s kind of offensive to say that. So anyway—I could get mad and angry about it but I’m not going to.

Partial Transcript: Well, one of the best ways that I can explain about the influence if a culture never changes, it’s kind of like water. Water is an amazing, beautiful thing. Water has the ability to sustain us, it gives us life. Water is life. And the thing about it is—but if water—you put water in a pool and it doesn’t move, it just sits there—soon it becomes stagnant. It becomes toxic. It becomes nasty. But if water moves and it’s agitated and it becomes oxygenated, it becomes—it stays alive. Water is a living entity, we believe that. And—but water has to be changed. And for Cherokees, we’re always adapting and changing. There was always the give and take. We were taking things. The way that we dress as warriors, 1760s era, around that time—they were basically—some of them were just basically white man’s clothes but we would adapt them and change them and make them our own.

They would be wearing—our leggings that used to be made with leather, now they’re made with wool. They’re still made the same way but they’re made with the materials—that’s a change. But we’re also picking up their musical instruments. We were learning the fiddle. We would even be able to say that—a lot of Cherokees say that they’re Christians. And they could be doing—going to water and doing Cherokee traditions but then also going to church. And this is where I think I have a hard time because I do consider myself a Christian, but because I’m a Christian doesn’t mean that I stop being a Cherokee. And the way that I believe is that God made me a Cherokee so I should be a Cherokee. I should learn my language. I should sing my songs. By doing that I honor Him.

And that’s the thing—the Tower of Babel. We weren’t all supposed to meant—we weren’t all meant to be speaking the same language. We’re not meant to be that. Tear it down. And so when we sing and we praise the Creator in our language with our songs—that’s praising Him. I can be in church and I could sing a hymn. I could praise Him. But as a Cherokee, when I sing my songs, when I sing in my language, and when I’m singing to Him, there is a little something special there. There is something that—there is something that I would say is very—an intimate connection. So I love that. But there’s always been a cross—we’ve been exchanging ideas and songs and adapting. And we turned their spiritual hymns into our own language.

We have a preacher man that’s here on the reservation. His name is Bo Parison. He’s a white man—came here but he learned Indian. He’ll be at a funeral and he’ll be singing the song and he’ll be booming, squaw te ne ses, de e ho oa, ala de ga e sa e. And he’s singing this loud and proud and it’s a white man. But he sings the Cherokee songs. He come in here, he had to learn and he was—but it went both ways. He taught, he learned. And it’s—that’s the way things are.

Partial Transcript: Well, people were asking me—as Cherokees we have some very talented people here. And it’s like a—I got a chance to go visit the Maoris of New Zealand and they’re related to the Hawaiians. But they always talk about the Maoris and that they’re very talented and they sing and—but they don’t like to work hard. These are things that are fallacies that we’re kind of taught. But it’s not true. And that’s the thing. It’s like—the inferences of how we see the world is somewhat different. We put our value system a little bit different.

There’s a—and I talk about Main Coast Natives. They say Mancos Nede(???). He’s—they say he was an awesome fiddle player. I never got to hear him. But I got to hear Walker play the banjo and I’ve seen a lot of—this is this old man that I knew that knew Cherokee and was teaching me. And I seen him dance around a fire and sing and blow everybody away. A little old man that—just amazing. But then I would have these people want to come and play banjo with him—to sit and pick and grin with him. That wasn’t my form of—I can’t—if it’s got strings, it should be a kite because it has no—I can’t play. And so it’s just not my thing. But people love to come and play with him.

There’s so many talented people here. Eddie Bushyhead, he’s one of our guys that’s around today that’s just so talented. And in the Georgia Hall of Fame for his music. Bill Crowe, this guy can—he sings like BB King when he’s—he could play a guitar and he’s just so amazing. But people don’t know who he is because he doesn’t feel the need to go out and say, “Look at me.” When they play their music, oftentimes they’re playing for themselves. They’re playing for just the love of it and if people like it, great, and if they don’t, that’s fine too. This is where it’s like—I kind of feel like I’m a product of the—I’m a product of the ‘80s. That’s when I did most of my growing up—‘70s and ‘80s. And I grew up in a time when TV came into being and fast food and computers came—started coming.

My first computer that I remember was in a big old gigantic room and now my phone is more powerful than that. But I’ve seen lots of changes and I’ve seen where it would be easy to go this way with the technology. You could go this way. The way that I try to do is, I try to go somewhere in the middle. Somewhere say, where there’s balance. I have to be able to feed my family. I have to be able to take care of myself. I have to be able to live in this world. But I also need to learn my songs. I need to learn my language. I need to be able to do this. And I can. And I’ve—bring them together and blend them together and there’s balance. You go one way or the other, then you’re out of balance.

And that’s kind of a keyword in our culture—it’s called the utiyvhi. Some people say it means straight but it means so much more. It means a way of being in balance. And so I mean, if I’m in 2017, I have to be in balance. So—

Partial Transcript: Well, Walker is this gentleman who’s passed. And I miss that guy every day. I do. I miss him. He was—he was just such an awesome guy. Kind of quiet and unassuming. He worked in a factory most of his life providing for his family and he always kind of tried to keep that alive. But it wasn’t until he got older that he got—came into prominence. People started realizing, hey, there ain’t anybody else that can sing these songs and he said, “I can.” And so he had a little family troop that would get out and they would sing. And I kind of ended up on his doorstep one day and I just kind of never left. And he just began to teach me. My grandpa died long ago and he—my grandpa knew things but I wasn’t able to pick it up.

So he taught me things. He—we sat around and we had a friendship that was an amazing—and he’s the guy that really kind of helped put that in me. And that’s the thing—it’s like—I really wish he was here today. I really wish—but that’s—as being a human being, what we’ve got to realize is we don’t have them. We don’t have them forever. We only have one life and the best thing we can do is leave it better than we found it. And he did.

Partial Transcript: Well, he taught me language. He taught me songs. He taught me how to chill out. He taught me how to—you could sit on a porch and be—and not say too much but learn so much. He taught me some humility. And it’s—that’s the thing, is I love that dude. I truly do. And—

Interviewer
What kind of impact do you think he made outside of—?

I think the impact that he made outside it’s—hell, it’s still being felt. People still talk about Walker and what he did. But the reason I was there—I wasn’t there as somebody watching the show or seeing him every once in a while. I saw him every week—every other day I was seeing this guy. And I got to be witness to where he kind of—evolved and became an icon to our people. And I’ve been around some amazing people. I mean, Walker, Jerry Wolfe. He was a beloved man. Robert Bushyhead, who’s—that dude had the voice of God. He was an amazing preacher man, linguist. I got to hang out with some heavyweights in Cherokee culture. And I’ve been blessed and the influence that they had—I don’t know if they knew how much they were broadcasting that. I don’t know how much their sphere of influence was—the impact that they had on—impacted me.

I attribute a lot of what I’ve learned and what I teach and what I—my philosophy is, is him. One thing I always remember is, people come to see him. There would be crazy people coming to see Walker Calhoun. He always treated them good. I always—he tried to be nice to them. I carry that every day. A true Cherokee—somebody comes into your home, you’re supposed to offer them food and offer them water. Something to drink. You try to take care of them. There’s a hospitality. And I think that’s kind of one of our downfalls. When the Europeans come in—we tried to be hospitable and it didn’t always work out. And I think as Cherokees—as Kituwhas we can’t turn our back on who we are though. We could get great jobs. We can do—get educations. But if we don’t know who we are as Cherokees then we’ve lost the battle. We’ve lost who we are.

But the one thing that I am, is very hopeful. There is a philosophy—a prophecy, I should say—and it said that the Cherokees would lose almost everything. They would get to the point where they would almost lose their language, they would lose their land, they would lose almost everything, their identity. But the Cherokees will get it back. Then all the other tribes would look to the Cherokees for their identity. And I used to think about that and it’s like—I’ve seen our culture do that. I saw it take a dip and saw that there was very few people that knew our songs and dances. And there was—remember I was telling you there was about five people that could sing the songs. Now there’s a bunch of guys that can sing the songs.

We have Nugateau Academy(???) where they’re teaching our kids all in Cherokee and they’re—we have a lot more speakers growing. An organic system of growing these kids to become speakers. And now people are coming and looking at us. So I used to think that was kind of being biggity as a—as Cherokee say, all the other tribes would look to us for their identity. It’s not that they want to be like us. But we would set the example and people would come and look at us. Now they do. They come and see how we do our language programs. They see that we are progressing our culture and they are emulating who we are and what we’re doing. So that’s what’s great.

Partial Transcript: Well, people wonder why Cherokees don’t play a bigger role in Appalachian music is because—I don’t know if people really want to acknowledge the fact that—if they acknowledge who we are as Cherokees, they have to acknowledge that they stole it. That they took out land, that they—that there is—there was a crime committed. And I don’t want to get into the fact that—and being—and hate. I can’t live in that. That’s not my point. But the fact is, Native people have often become caricatures. We’re not real. We are something that’s on TV. We’re some image at a football game or—that we’re not real.

But we’ve been here and we’re still here. And the fact is, it’s like—people don’t acknowledge us because oftentimes we don’t go out and try to—I don’t go seeking acknowledgment. I don’t need that to solidify who I am. I don’t have to say, well, you stole that or that’s ours or whatever. I’m confident in who we are and it’s like—there’s elements that could be ours, but I know what belongs to me. When we sing our songs and we do our dances, now those belong to me. Now, if I saw some cat out here trying to imitate that or—and for lack of a better word, bastardize my culture then I’m going to say, hey, no, no. We’ve got an issue here.

But for me, it’s like—I truly believe the reason that we haven’t been acknowledged as much is because we haven’t really sought it. But if you really do look at it—I think we are a part. Yeah, we’re a part of it. But whether we get acknowledged or not, I’m not going to lose sleep over it.

Partial Transcript: Well, I remember there was this guy named Bill Crowe who was a—first time I ever met Bill we were sitting around a camp fire and they were picking and grinning. It was back when I was a younger man and we were sitting around probably doing things we shouldn’t have been doing. But I remember him—that night I was amazed. I was like—because I got there and I was—we were sitting around the fire and he was—they had these guitars. And him and one other guy and they were sitting around this fire and they were playing Neil Young. I didn’t know Neil Young. Well, I knew—when I was growing up I knew Boston and all these bands from the ‘70s and— Lynyrd Skynyrd. But when they were playing Neil Young and they—it changed me. They were just like—it was just so perfect and raw and the music was—it was awesome.

And I didn’t see Bill for a long time. Every once in a while, I’d see Bill and he would be carving or something. This guys is so multi-talented. He could do all kinds of things. And he could do anything he wanted. So dang talented. And then I was at a—he was doing a little concert at this pow-wow and he was doing BB King. He had a—he looked like he was a—BB King with Lucille up there. And he was playing the blues. And again, I was floored. I was amazed listening to this Cherokee dude singing. Amazing. And then he shows up and he sings a song about his grandma. It’s kind of a Cherokee theme. But there’s still a lot of soul in that dude. When I hear him sing and—he’s like one of my favorites.

And if I could say anything about Bill that I really wish he could have done more. He’s still alive and—but this is where I need to step back and say, that is his gift. His gift is for him. His gift isn’t for me. And if he wants to share it, he’ll share it. And if he doesn’t, he doesn’t. And that’s the thing. That’s the kind of mentality that he has. I could wish for fame and fortune for him and all this other stuff, but this dude—he has been touched. He’s just so talented. And so those are the kind of guys that—I don’t know. They influence me. But I do what I can.

Partial Transcript: Well, here’s the thing, it’s like—as Cherokees, what role do we play? It’s like—sure, we had the Manco Sneeds in the other world that came in, picked up a banjo, and can just tear it up or a banjo or a fiddle or whatever. And you got Eddie Bushyheads of the world that are flutists, guitar player, everything. But when you pull—scale it all back and you pull it back to who we are as Cherokees in the raw form—when we were able—when we go out and do our performances and we got sit among people that have never experienced Cherokee culture and they go away and they say, “That was awesome. I had such a good time.” And you can see it when we’re dancing and they’ll be—they’ll be from another culture and they’ll get into it because the spirit’s there when they feel that. And it’s like—that’s it. That’s when I know, hey, being a Cherokee is an awesome thing. It’s a great thing being me. And that’s why I know, hey, I’m doing the right thing. Because we’re not playing a stringed instrument, because we’re not picking and grinning—even though we can—we still are from Appalachia. We still belong here. We are not a museum piece. We’re still here. We still got it going on.

And that’s one thing I would kind of hope that Appalachian music doesn’t get into this place where they have to feel like they have to put on the role, to put on big old suspenders and be all hee haw or whatever to play out to what they think people want to see. Appalachian music’s adapting and changing. It could still be a fiddle but it might be—ACDC on a fiddle or something. It’s constantly changing. And if we don’t change then it does die. Then it is a museum piece and it’s not real. If you just keep regurgitating the same old music then—that is a dead language. Music’s not supposed to be that way and that’s why it’s like—hey, if you go and see an Appalachian review you see some Cherokee guys running around in breech clothes and singing, and then you see another Cherokee guy coming up playing blues—hell, that’s Cherokee music. It is what it is.

Partial Transcript: I think we—what do we lose if we don’t remember all that we contributed, I think we kind of lose our soul. It’s like—and I think that’s—I think we need that as human beings. We need to be able to be tied back to something. We have to be able to be—there is a constant need for us to know our origins. And say, that’s it’s like immaculate conception that we just—it just happened, it’s ridiculous. The fact is, is that the music has been passed on. It has been handed down. It is a tradition. And that’s the thing, if we don’t have that, it has no heart. It has no soul. It’s like, I like these young guys that are playing music. And they could be playing, changing it up, and adapting it. And you can see some of the old-timers saying, no, that’s not the way we did it. Well, they can still do it the way you did it but they’re living in 2017. They have to do it the way they do it. And so that’s a good thing.

Partial Transcript: The one thing that I would say is like, everybody has something to give. Everybody. You might feel like you have nothing to contribute. But me, as somebody that—I’m here at the museum and everybody says that’s the Cherokee guy. I’m the guy that was growing up I was ashamed to be Cherokee. I’m the guy that was ashamed of my culture. I’m the guy that didn’t want to get in the sun because I didn’t want to get dark. I kept my hair real short because I was ashamed of who I was. And I was lost. And when I come to terms with the fact that I’m Cherokee, I love who I am, I am what I am—that opened up so many doors for me.

And so when people have the opportunity—if you don’t feel like you can give back, then you need to learn. That means turn the TV off, go where there—I mean, if you’re part of this culture, if you live in Appalachia, if you grew up here, then you’re part of this culture. You have a kind of responsibility. Now, people come into our museum all the time and they go, “I’m Indian.” Deep down in thinking, I don’t care. But the moment they say that they’re Cherokee, then I say, “Now I care.” What you’re saying is that you’re part of me. That we have the same blood. Then I’m going to hold you to a higher standard. And then it’s my responsibility to say, “I can’t let you go away acting that way.” It’s my responsibility to say, “Learn a little bit. Try to cultivate who that is and what that means. Don’t just say it. It’s just words.” It has to be tied to something. It has to have more than empty words.

And that’s the thing, as Cherokees we valued oration, to be able to speak. But we knew our words weren’t empty. And it’s like—the fact is, English is a great language for lawyers because you can change it and twist it and make it whatever you want without saying the full truth. So for me, if you’re going to be part of this culture, you’ve got to give back. You’ve got to give something. You can’t always take. That’s about all I got.

Partial Transcript: My drum’s a little flat. This is one of the songs that’s—that I like to sing. It’s called a horse dance and it’s kind of a lively dance and it’s one of our newer dances. And it’s—the men and women, they line up—man, woman, man, woman. But they’re like a team of horses and they’re kind of locked arms or holding hands. And they’ll march forward, forward and back. Maybe like they’re plowing a field going forward and back. But then the song will pick up and—like a horse will dance. A horse will prance. The song becomes lively and it does—it has that same type of motions. It goes something like this. (plays drum) Too loud?