LIVED AS SQUAW

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIII, 13 July 1929, Page 5

LIVED AS SQUAW

i WOMAN COLLECTS OLD MUSIC ESKIMO AND INDIAN A neyy music--yet tho oldesl ia_ Dm world lias been Lajcotj to EnghituL So old is iL that mothers in the Stout! Ago lulled llicit' habit's to sloop with its unusual lianuony. It is the music of the Eskimos and the North American Indian*;, which musicians and scientists vouch is from 5 000 to 10,000 years old. It. tolls of tiie tribal customs and the feast.ings and lightings of the lied man, and of the joys and sorrows of the Eskimo amid Ids snow and ice. i At the suggestion of the Canadian Government, Miss Juliette" Gaultier, a direct descendant of the famous French explorer, Pierre Gaultier de la Verendrye, the discoverer of the Can•'udian Rockies, went to London to give a recital. Trained for opera by Lombardi, teacher of Ciavuso, Miss Gaultier gave up her stage career seven years ago for the task of collecting the ancientsaga, chants and incantations of the Red Indians and Eskimos. LIFE OF A SQUAW She has 'lived the life of the Indians. enduring hardship and facing many dangers. ■She has collected between '■2oo and ,300 unknown songs' which have been handed down from father to sou from I the Stone Age, gild these have been Translated and registered in Canada’s national archives. “I spent four to five months each dear living the* life of a squaw in a tee-pee in the Indian reserves,” Miss [Gaultier said. “The first thing is to gain their ; confidence. To gain their confidence :] wear their clothes—vyhite buckskin, j head headband, and feather —and talk flimv Innrmno-n. •

; iJieir language, ■ : “When we have made friends 1 sing those of their songs I know, which so,» surprises them that they usually , respond with other songs, which I write down note for note.” ■ SACRED RATTLE To retain the spirit of the music -Miss Gaultier accompanies herself only on the primitive instruments of the Red niijn and Eskimo. Her only instruments are An Eskimo tom-tom, a mere strip of hide stretched across a shallow hoop. Indian drum., : Rattle of reindeer hoofs and, cedar bark. A sacreVj rattle for healing the sick, made of old trading beads. These she •yrill use at her recital in London, when she will appear on the platform in the dresses of a squaw and an Eskimo.