Flutes, Songs and Dreams

Cycles of Creation and Musical Performance among the Wauja of the Upper Xingu (Brazil)

Bibliographic Data

ID5801706
AuthorsAcácio Tadeu De Camargo Piedade, Acácio Piedade (0000-0001-7813-084X, corresponding author)
Year2013
Volume22
Issue3
Pages306-322
Publication date2013-11-21
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueBritish Journal of Ethnomusicology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0968-1221 • E-ISSN: 1741-1920
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/17411912.2013.844441
OpenAlexW2029178520
LanguageEN
Citations received12
References cited9

The Wauja of the Upper Xingu say that their musical ritual is simultaneously of and for the spirits. I will address some factors of their cosmology and shamanism, and then investigate men's kawoká rituals and women's songs performed in iamurikumã rituals. I consider these two rituals to be integral parts of a single set, the kawoká-iamurikumã symbolic-ritual complex, in which there is a deep correlation between men, women and spirits: the latter transmit their musical creations to humans through dreams. Only the male master of the kawoká flutes and the female mistress of the iamurikumã songs are capable of memorising and reproducing this musical material. During ritual performance, the women transform the music of the flutes into iamurikumã songs and vice versa. Through ritual performance, the musical creation of the spirits is returned to them in a humanised and transformed form

Musical form · Shamanism · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Indigenous Health and Education · Social Representations and Identity