Drums and Rattles
American Indians use drums, rattles,
whistles, flutes,
and zithers. Many of these wind and percussion instruments are designed to echo aspexts of nature. Their primary function is sacred, for use in ceremony, prayer, and healing rites.
The drum simulates the Earth Mother's heartbeat, or it can imitate thunder and pounding rain. Played very softly, it can sound like breath, wind, running water, or game animals. Much depends on whether one strokes or rubs it with the palm or fingers of the hand or uses a drumstick. There are many different types of drums--the small, sacred single-faced water drum of the Delaware and Iroquois in the Northeast;
the large double-sided cottonwood drums of the Plains;
the various hand-held, single-faced shaman's drums found in many regions
but all convey the vitality of the drum in native life.
Rattles, like drums are complex, and their type, construction, and ornamentation speak volumes about which tribe made them and for what purpose. In the East, people pierced deer toes (the dark horn tips) and strung them close together with rawhide or sinew;
tribes in northern sub-Artic regions did the same with bony puffin beaks.
These clusters of musical rattles were carried or worn by dancers or shamans. People also use rattles made of gourds,
folded bark,
horn,
or bone
as well as rainsticks
to call the rain spirits and other environmental evergies needed for prayers, celebrations, and curing ceremonies.
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