Music Inspired by the Playing for Change

Music Inspired by the Playing for Change movement, and especially the recording of the classic "Stand By Me," my group decided to focus on fusing Native American sounds with contemporary music. The motivation is clear: to keep indigenous themes relevant and respond continually to the social and political inspirations for creative expression. Using this approach to our music allowed us to transcend the concept of genre, which can be too limiting, especially with regards to traditional and folk music.

Rather than view Native American music as fitting into rigid stylistic structures and specific instrumentations, we believed it would be helpful to broaden and expand the concept of indigenous sound. We use the example of hip-hop in particular to show that music can and does respond to social and political realties, which are ever-present in the lives of Native Americans. Like hip-hop, the music of indigenous people is often rooted in protest.

Also like hip-hop, indigenous music bears a strong tradition of storytelling, which can be used to describe either micro-level (personal) or macro-level (community) identities (Chretien, n.d.). Our team was determined to fuse contemporary music with indigenous music by focusing on their common threads, one of which was the art and social function of storytelling. We worked hard on the development of our lyrics, knowing that their meaning would resonate deeply with the listener regardless of race, religion, or gender.

The overall concepts of healing, oneness, and peace offer messages of hope. This reflects what Wallace (n.d.) calls "intercultural collaboration." Intercultural collaboration invites an ongoing and diverse dialogue between various people and points-of-view. In music, intercultural collaborations can be especially fruitful and fulfilling, as musicians discover their shared perspectives. This is exactly what the video "Stand By Me" imparts: the sense that the whole world can be connected over one song.

The images in the video are from different places in the world, but the people are playing the same song. Musical points in common could be drum beats and time signatures, or melodic forms, or instruments. While we worked on our project, the members of the team shared the music from their personal backgrounds and personal tastes. Collaborating together meant that our song would reflect the core values of humanity.

Rather than focusing too much on difference, focusing on multiculturalism also allowed us to compose something that was meaningful to each of us individually as well as collectively in our society. The reason why hip-hop resonated with our group is because it is a contemporary musical form that has undergone many changes since its inception in the early 1980s in New York. Now, hip-hop has permeated the world even in its most remote locations like rural Saskatchewan (Marsh, n.d.).

Just as Chretien (n.d.) points out, hip-hop is essentially about storytelling, and often has a political dimension. Just as the project Marsh (n.d.) describes, ours "combines local, cultural, and regional elements with current global hip-hop forms and stylistic traits," (p. 2). The music becomes an anchor in the present moment, causing us and our listeners to reflect on the problems that we hope to address. Also, the music becomes a common thread of hope. Through the vocals and instrumentation, we have endeavoured to come up with a.