Reggae Rising

Why Sacred Ceremonies at World Music Festivals?

By Bret Lueder

From the shadows of Mt. Shasta to the rocky banks of the Eel River, Native peoples from many tribes have been performing sacred ceremonies at the beginning of several reggae and world music festivals in northern California and elsewhere.

I first witnessed this as Pawnee Seedsman Scott Walking Buffalo led an opening ceremony at the 2003 Renegade Reggae Festival at the Mt. Shasta Board and Ski Park. Along with sharing the general sentiments of peace and love, Walking Buffalo emphasized the need to propagate natural seed banks in opposition to the corporate practice of patenting seeds.

He also explained that because of the Original Migrations (according to Hopi tradition), many Natives recognized the Rasta musicians performing at these events as being of the “same people.” So they decided to join their brethren at the celebration in the spirit of joy, awareness, and thanksgiving. These types of positive messages and good vibes have also been delivered in ceremonial settings at the Sierra Nevada World Music Festival, the High Sierra World Music Festival, and Earthdance, among others.

The practice possibly got its start back in the mid-’80s with one of the world’s most well-known events, Reggae Rising (formerly known as Reggae on the River).

Since then Native elders from many tribes have participated in the opening ceremonies at this three-day-long concert. From the Yurok, the Hoopa, the Pawnee, the Pomo, among others, elders have come to pray, chant, drum, and dance in honor of the Eel River, the surrounding land and people, and the many who annually journey to this special place in the spirit of celebration and togetherness.

But no elders are more important and revered during Reggae Rising than the Kenneste elder Fred Downey, known as “Coyote”—the Kenneste are known to anthropologists as the Wailaki. “Kenneste” is their word for themselves, said Coyote. “It means ‘human being.’” The Eel River is part of the Kenneste homeland and hence, sacred land. So the elder makes a point to speak to the many attendees who are camping on hallowed ground and simply reminds them that they have certain responsibilities when visiting. Although Coyote recognizes that all human beings are of the same race—a tenet expressed in the Original Migrations metaphor—he does this not because of the Hopi knowledge but because it is the universal way in which to greet guests when they come to your home.

Said Downey in a soft, rusty voice, “As human beings we have certain responsibilities and that includes treating each other in nice ways, being respectful of one another, and we’ll all get along good.” I welcome them because this is my homeland. It’s a beautiful place. The river is a part of our life. We want to keep the river clean because a lot of our relatives like the fish; they come up that river and reproduce. We have [celebratory] ceremony for the salmon. It is a very important time. So if you must have your community-gathering on the river then treat the river with a lot of respect. That’s all we ask and you’re all welcome here.”

From my three visits with Downey, I am only beginning to get a glimpse of the Kenneste worldview: There is God’s law and there is man’s law. The Kenneste, he says, live by God’s law, that being that they always honor the four elements of creation: fire, wind, water, and earth. Downey reasoned that everything after these four elements is man’s law. An easy way to tell the difference, he says, is that man’s laws are complicated and God’s laws are simple.

It was going to take time for me to grasp the way in which Downey and the Kenneste saw reality. Complicating my understanding further was that he was adamant that words were merely a bridge to actually describing the Kenneste experience. I took this to mean that the map (words) is not the territory (experience).

However, he was able to sum up his message for Reggae Rising’s visitors with two words: “It’s love.” He paused to let me think about it and then continued. “Like when a baby gets milk from its mother’s breast, it’s the spiritual food where all humans begin. The love is what holds a community together.”

“So when they first asked me to come to Reggae on the River [now Reggae Rising], I came and gave an opening talk about who we are as a people. … This was a community of people coming together for just a few days. And so there was a lot of young people and our traditional elders tell us that whenever we talk we should be talking with the young people because they’re the ones who will be going on into the future. But what we are instructed to say, regardless of who we are talking to, is always the same: how to be a good human being and help each other by reminding ourselves who we are in simple terms.”

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