The light of the Summer Solstice pours into the prayer smoke from the four sacred herbs. In the far left of the image is a weathered and worn mortar and pestle from the Cherokee Trail of Tears. The metáte was given to us by Tom Morgan, a Cherokee himself, whose family’s cabin sits atop Dayton Mountain near Morgan Springs in Tennessee, where thousands of displaced Native Americans passed through on foot on their way to the Oklahoma Territory, eight hundred miles to the west. Tom is the President of the Cherokee Removal Memorial Park at Blythe Ferry, Tennessee and he has been like a second father to me.
I offer music in sacred spaces. The following piece is the melody with which I consecrate my intention with the spirits of place. Beginning in pentatonic scale, the language of Elóhi (Cherokee for earth), it transitions into diatonic, moving into broader and richer phrases of asking. Just as we experience answers and enlightenments as a series of new questions and possibilities, the music is designed to refrain, unfolding without full resolution.
From the Snow on Water channel on SoundCloud, please enjoy “Signet” in the loving spirit in which it is offered. Transcendent, soporific, and vision-inducing, it takes us to that liminal space between waking and dreams.
Called by some the voice of the Earth, this spare piece is best enjoyed with full range speakers.
The web address below from National Geographic offers more insight into the project honoring the Cherokee and their legacy. Copy and paste it to visit the site.
http://www.tennesseerivervalleygeotourism.org/content/cherokee-removal-memorial-park-at-historic-blythe-ferry/ten7DCDE1AE75A3CC4D4
