Pow-Wow Songs From Rocky Boy

Sung by the Rocky Boy Haystack Ramblers

Canyon Records
Charles Gopher, leader; Robert Favel, John G. Meyers, rocky Stump, and John Windy Boy.
There are twelve songs on the record. All are war dance-type songs, used for recreational dancing at pow-wows. They consist chiefly of rhythmic sounds with drum accompaniment, rather than word songs.
Rocky Boy is the name of an Indian Reservation in Montana, south of Havre, Montana. It draws its name from a Chippewa leader called Stone Child, whose name in the course of time became Rocky Boy.
Nearly a hundred years ago, according to Bureau of Indian Affairs Publication "Indians of Montana and Wyoming," a band of Chippewa (Ojibway) Indians from Minnesota moved west into the Dakotas, then into Canada, then back across the border into Montana. In the same period Chief Little Bear's band of Cree Indians for years drifted back and forth across the international boundary.
These groups, having no land base of their own, had to keep moving. They visited on the Reservations of land-established tribes; they managed some kind of existence on the outskirts of Northern Plains towns - Havre, Chinook, Great Falls, Butte. In 1896 the United States attempted to deport them to Canada, but they wanted to live south of the Canadian border, and promptly returned.
In 1916 their leaders, Rocky Boy and Little Bear, with a group of prominent Montana citizens urges the U.S. Government to designate a homeland for them. The "Rocky Boy" Reservation of 55,000 acres was created by Executive Order out of the old Fort Assiniboine Military Reserve. In later years, enough lands were gradually added to bring the tribal reserve to about 100,000 acres. It is chiefly grazing land.
Employment is quite limited because of the nature of the land, and the somewhat remote location of the reservation. Some families own small herds of cattle, or lease their land to non-Indian cattlemen.

Play song

Name

Performed by

Description

Native Words

Translation

Notes

Pow Wow Song 1 Chippewa
Pow Wow Song 2 Chippewa
Pow Wow Song 3 Chippewa
Pow Wow Song 4 Chippewa
Pow Wow Song 5 Chippewa
Pow Wow Song 6 Chippewa
Pow Wow Song 7 Chippewa
Pow Wow Song 8 Chippewa
Pow Wow Song 9 Chippewa
Pow Wow Song 10 Chippewa
Pow Wow Song 11 Chippewa
Pow Wow Song 12 Chippewa