Seminole music

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Seminole music is the music of the Seminole people, an indigenous people of the Americas who formed in Florida in the 18th century. Today most live in Oklahoma, but a minority continue in Florida. They have three federally recognized tribes, and some people belong to bands outside those groups. Their traditional music includes extensive use of rattles, hand drums, water drums, and flutes.

Seminole folk songs include those used to treat the sick and injured, and to encourage animals to be easily hunted. Hunting songs are a cappella and call-and-response.

The two major ritual dances are the Green Corn Dance, held in June, and the Hunting Dance, held in October. Other informal dances are held throughout the year, with some specific dances only performed in either summer or winter. Many dances are connected with an animal spirit, such as the Snake, the Crawfish and the very important Alligator.

Western Presbyterian Christian missionaries and Creek translators developed Muskogee language hymns in the 1830s that continue to be sung in Creek and Seminole churches today in Oklahoma. The hymns are syncretic constructions with texts and performance practices that carry Muskogee and Western meanings at once. [1] [2]

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Seminole Native American people originally from Florida

The Seminole are a Native American people who developed in Florida in the 18th century. Today, they live in Oklahoma and Florida, and comprise three federally recognized tribes: the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma, the Seminole Tribe of Florida, and Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida, as well as independent groups. The Seminole people emerged in a process of ethnogenesis from various Native American groups who settled in Spanish Florida beginning in the early 1700s, most significantly northern Muscogee Creeks from what is now Georgia and Alabama.

Osceola Seminole leader

Osceola, named Billy Powell at birth in Alabama, became an influential leader of the Seminole people in Florida. His mother was Muscogee, and his great-grandfather was a Scotsman, James McQueen. He was reared by his mother in the Creek (Muscogee) tradition. When he was a child, they migrated to Florida with other Red Stick refugees, led by a relative, Peter McQueen, after their group's defeat in 1814 in the Creek Wars. There they became part of what was known as the Seminole people.

Muskogee or Muscogee can refer to:

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Brighton Seminole Indian Reservation Seminole Indian Reservation in Florida, United States

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Muscogee language Indigenous American language

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Yuchi Native American ethnic group

The Yuchi people, also spelled Euchee and Uchee, are a Native American tribe based in Oklahoma.

Black Seminoles Ethnic group

The Black Seminoles, or Afro-Seminoles are Indian-Negroes associated with the Seminole people in Florida and Oklahoma. They are mostly blood descendants of the Seminole people, free blacks, and escaped slaves, who allied with Seminole groups in Spanish Florida. Many have Seminole lineage, but due to the stigma of having very dark or black skin and kinky hair, they all have been categorized as slaves or freedmen.

Stomp dance

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Green Corn Ceremony Native American custom

The Green Corn Ceremony (Busk) is an annual ceremony practiced among various Native American peoples associated with the beginning of the yearly corn harvest. Busk is a term given to the ceremony by white traders, the word being a corruption of the Creek word puskita (pusketv) for "a fast". These ceremonies have been documented ethnographically throughout the North American Eastern Woodlands and Southeastern tribes. Historically, it involved a first fruits rite in which the community would sacrifice the first of the green corn to ensure the rest of the crop would be successful. These Green Corn festivals were practiced widely throughout southern North America by many tribes evidenced in the Mississippian people and throughout the Mississippian Ideological Interaction Sphere. Green Corn festivals are still held today by many different Southeastern Woodland tribes. The Green Corn Ceremony typically occurs in late July–August, determined locally by the ripening of the corn crops. The ceremony is marked with dancing, feasting, fasting and religious observations.

Miccosukee Native American tribe in Florida who speak the Mikasuki language

The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida is a federally recognized Native American tribe in the U.S. state of Florida. They were part of the Seminole nation until the mid-20th century, when they organized as an independent tribe, receiving federal recognition in 1962. The Miccosukee speak the Mikasuki language, which is mutually intelligible with the Hitchiti language, is considered its dialect, and is also spoken by many Florida Seminole.

The Hitchiti were a historic indigenous tribe in the Southeast United States. They formerly resided chiefly in a town of the same name on the east bank of the Chattahoochee River, four miles below Chiaha, in western present-day Georgia. The natives possessed a narrow strip of good land bordering on the river. The Hitchiti had a reputation of being honest and industrious.

Seminole Tribe of Florida

The Seminole Tribe of Florida is a federally recognized Seminole tribe based in the U.S. state of Florida. Together with the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma and the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida, it is one of three federally recognized Seminole entities. It received that status in 1957; today it has six Indian reservations in Florida.

The Alabama–Quassarte Tribal Town is both a federally recognized Native American tribe and a traditional township of Muskogean-speaking Alabama and Coushatta peoples. Their traditional languages include Alabama, Koasati, and Mvskoke. As of 2014, the tribe includes 369 enrolled members, who live within the state of Oklahoma as well as Texas, Louisiana, and Arizona.

Seminole Nation of Oklahoma Indian reservation

The Seminole Nation of Oklahoma is a federally recognized Native American tribe based in the U.S. state of Oklahoma. It is the largest of the three federally recognized Seminole governments, which include the Seminole Tribe of Florida and the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida. Its members are descendants of the 3,000 Seminoles who were forcibly removed from Florida to Indian Territory, along with 800 Black Seminoles, after the Second Seminole War. The Seminole Nation of Oklahoma is headquartered in Wewoka within Seminole County, Oklahoma. Of 18,800 enrolled tribal members, 13,533 live in Oklahoma. The tribe began to revive its government in 1936 under the Indian Reorganization Act. While its reservation was originally larger, today the tribal jurisdictional area covers Seminole County, Oklahoma, within which it has a variety of properties.

References

  1. Heth and Taborn. AmeriGrove. "Seminole Music", 2013
  2. Heth, Charlotte , and Karen Taborn. 2013. “Seminole.” The Grove Dictionary of American Music. 2nd ed. Ed. by Charles Hiroshi Garrett. New York: Oxford University Press, 433-434.