Concert Review: My House Is The Red American Musical Effect

On Wednesday, October 5, 2016 at 8:00 pm, I have attended a performance by Joy Harjo and her friends Mitch Taylor who played the guitar, Dave Copenhaver who played the bass guitar, and Smiling’ Vic Gutierrez who played the drums and vocals. I had specifically chose this performance to do my report on because I wanted to feel what actual Native American music would be like in concert as opposed to what we naturally think of when it comes to Native American music. For me, that would include heavy drumming and dancing, which are usually even-pulsed with a variety of vocables. Not to my disappointment, the music was unique in its own way and had spoke directly to me. The performance started off with the song titled “My House is the Red Earth” in which I was peculiar surprised with. The piece began off with Joy playing the saxophone and then later was joined by the guitars and drums with a slow melody. They had kept an upbeat pace of …show more content…
To my surprise, this unique song was not in the program provided to us but was still played. The song opened quietly again with Joy playing the saxophone. As the song progressed, the drumbeats and guitar players joined in, pausing after every phrase that Joy had sang. It became increasingly dramatic, yet holding the atmospheric mood at a relaxing level. In my opinion, the lyrics had helped established that. I remembered that the lyrics tried to convey to us the logic of war being inevitable and that what was once on the grounds of the battlefield will be replaced my new things. In a way I was able to interpret that as a new beginning but also a true sad part of our life. The fact that she used an inspiring tone to talk to us, she drew us in with the climax tension of the song. Even when it seemed like the song was dying out, she and the other performers managed to keep us in with the groove of the music till the song had ended