Category: Interview

Standing Stones Mabon – Interview

I had the honor to attend the Coven of the Standing Stones community Mabon celebration last weekend. This is a private, by invitation event, but those for whom it is needed, or appropriate for, always seem to find an invitation (or you can ask for one). If you ask; “What is this coven known for?” , most would say they excel in the ‘craft’ of the Craft, they put together a solid ritual experience. They are the most welcoming group you will find, and take pride in their diversity and inclusiveness.  Standing Stones has been supportive of many community groups and events over the years, particularly helping the local Covenant of the Goddess raise needed funds for survival a few years back, and ongoing help cleaning the highway with the Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance (UMPA) and raising funds for that group. If you can’t find them at Magus Books offering free classes, look wherever you see Pagan community growing and they are likely somewhere involved!

Standing Stones is a coven of leaders.  I got a chance to corner three of the most visible. Don, John, and Tamara, and ask some questions.

How long have you been doing a community Mabon?
John: This is the eighth year we have held this event as a community Mabon.

How many folks do you have attending?
John:  By our count, close to 120. A pretty good turnout! It’s a large family.

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Why do you hold this event?
John:  It is a way we give back to our community. By giving back some of our bounty, we help build our community. Our community gives to us and we have to give something back.

We started inviting our community to celebrate Mabon with us about eight years ago. About 70 people attended. Some in our community have been at every one. We feel honored by that. We used to hold both a community Ostara and a Mabon, because we liked honoring the balance of light and dark at both times of the year. But they got so large and came up so quickly that we decided it was best to just offer one. We picked Mabon because it is a time of abundance. We thought, let’s feed everybody and pick a time when we can all be outside and enjoy some great weather.

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Shedding the Past, A Rite of Passage – Interview

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Marla with Dreadlocks

I had the honor to attend and drum for a Moribayassa (see explanation of this rite of passage below) for Marla, a participant at the Sacred Fire Circle at Circle Sanctuary last week. One of the unique benefits of participating in a Pagan community is the opportunity to share in rites of passage, and have a community of support and celebration for your own rites.  Pagans are as creative with the rituals that define and celebrate life’s transitions, as they are diverse in their beliefs.  This ritual was to celebrate the cutting of the dreadlocks from Marla’s head. For her it was the symbol of many changes in her life, setting aside the past, and an ending of a personal commitment the dreadlocks represented for her.  It was a powerful and joyous rite.

Listen to an excerpt of Moribayassa from this ritual

I asked Laurie, a Madison, WI.  hand drummer who helped organize the ritual, what is a traditional  Moribayassa  like?  

Laurie:  Moribayassa is a rhythm and a dance that comes from Guinea, West Africa. It is performed by a woman just once in her lifetime. She does this dance as a way to celebrate having overcome some kind of adversity in her lifetime. She will announce she will do the dance sometimes years in advance, and drummers and singers gather when the time approaches to help her. The woman will dress in rags, which is a big deal because Africans are very concerned about their appearance. She dances in the rags and dances like she is ‘crazy’.  She dances several times throughout the village, and when she is done she takes off the rags and buries them, usually under a tree. She is then dressed in new clothing symbolizing that now she is a new person. She has overcome the difficulty, it is in the past now, and behind her.  It was quite an honor to play this rhythm for Marla in the context that it was meant for.    You can read more, and learn the rhythm in   “ A Life for the Djembe” by Mamady Keita.

I talked to Marla the day after her ritual.  She was still overwhelmed from the ritual.

When did you start dreading your hair?
Marla: In the spring of 2008.  My ex-husband’s sister was dieing of cancer. I hadn’t had contact with them for 15 years. His wife told him I should  be told, so he called me. His sister was a hairstylist, age forty. They called just as she was put on oxygen, and a week later she was gone.  After that, I just quit combing my hair because it just wasn’t important to me anymore.  It was compounded by the fact I hit forty and still hadn’t had children. That’s were it started, because I felt I was wasting time, and to honor her life.  My niece initially twisted my hair, and then they all came back out. I tried again back-combing it into dreadlocks and then super gluing beads in them so they couldn’t untangle any more.  Finally they started to “dread” on their own.

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Ubaka Hill at Women’s Drum Center – Interview

Ubaka Hill

Ubaka Hill is appearing in Minnesota this week, sponsored by the W0men’s Drum Center.

CONCERT: Rhythms for the Trees: A Concert of Percussion, Poetry, Song and Vision

Featuring Ubaka Hill and with Drumheart. Open to the general public Saturday, August 25, 2012

Doors open at 6:00 p.m. for the Marketplace , Performance begins at 7:00 p.m.

Jeanne d’Arc Auditorium, Whitby Hall, St. Catherine University 2004 Randolph Ave., St.Paul, MN

Ubaka’s 2-day Workshop: Drumsong: the Art and Spirit of Drumming

(for women and girls)

Friday, August 24, 2012, 6:30-9:00 p.m. & Saturday, August 25, 9:30-1:30p.m.

At Carondolet Center, 1890 Randolph Ave., St.Paul

Register for workshop ($60) at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/258804

Ubaka arrived Monday to prepare for a week of appearances around Minnesota, we talked by phone.

What brings you to Minnesota?
The Women’s Drum Center ( WDC ) is responsible for brings me out and setting up the workshops and concert, and setting up the Million Women Drummers Gathering 2013 , what we call, “Meet and Greets”. One of those will include a workshop but these are primarily to speak about the Million Women Drummers Gathering 2013 initiative/movement and how local and global communities and individuals can be a part of it.

What is the Million Women Drummers Gathering 2013?
It is a two tiered, tow levels, and two phased program. There is a gathering planned for October 11-13th, 2013. Between now and that date it is about raising our consciousness, and becoming more awake and aware that our wooden musical instruments are trees. As simple as that is, it is quite profound to become aware that we are participating in the deforestation of our old growth forests, our third world local woods, and of our wooded areas within the US and around the world. I have been drumming on the wooden drum for over thirty years. There was a point where I was not as awake and aware, and mindful of my participation indirectly, by being a consumer of drums, in the deforestation and the senseless cutting and disrespect of the trees, and the woods. In the sustainability of our future. Around 2007, something awakened inside of me. That awakening had to do with our unconscious consumption of wooden instruments. I am including all wooden instruments, from acoustic guitars, to upright bass’s; pianos, marimba, clarinets, flutes, violins, cellos harps, all the instruments. If we do not sustain the trees that our wooden instruments are made from, we do not have a future for those instruments that we love to play, and listen to, that we enjoy dancing to. We won’t be able to sustain the music of those trees and so won’t be able to sustain the folkloric traditions of our various cultures. Generations that will follow us, will also not have the trees or the wooden instruments for those trees to play.

The Million Women Drummers Gathering 2013 initiative is essentially about creating a new mindful model as musicians and listeners, and players of wooden instruments. This call is coming from the leadership of women who love drums and who love trees. The Gathering in 2013 is a celebration of our new awake and aware selves, and our effort to create a new mindful model through planting trees, through having conversations about trees and creating a sustainable future, and to celebrate this by creating local rhythm circles including all players of wooden instruments while we plant trees and while we begin to create new technologies, ideas, and new approaches to a sustainable green policy for manufacturers, new traditions and new ways to approach the trees and the forest with gratitude and appreciation and the their replenishment.

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Andras Corban Arthen – Sacred Harvest Festival Guest – Interview

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I can listen to Andras Corban Arthen all day. He has a rich, low voice with the gentle cadence of caring. He has a lifetime of experience in the Pagan community, and the depth of perception and the wisdom of his words keeps you riveted.  He is presenting and performing all next week at Sacred Harvest Festival, near Geneva, Minnesota.  Advance registration closes today, gate registration is available during the event Aug. 6-12th.

Andras Corban Arthen

You are just back from Europe, what were you doing there?

Andras: I go to Europe fairly often, since I have family and friends across the pond (I’m from Spain, originally), and a big part of my work is focused there. This trip served several purposes, the main one being related to a book I am writing, based on one of the presentations I will be doing at Sacred Harvest Festival (SHF) entitled The “Indians” of Old Europe. It looks at the cultures and spiritual practices that were originally called “Pagan” in the context of indigenous traditions from around the world. For over 35 years I’ve been searching for people in Europe who may be keeping alive the remnants of the old ethnic spiritual traditions of their countries, and have found some, both in Eastern and Western Europe, mostly in small, rural, out-of-the-way places where the old languages are still spoken. Most of them do not use the label “Pagan,” though their practices are not Christian and appear to be authentically very old. In some significant ways, they are quite different from what one typically finds in the modern pagan movement, and there are some important things that I think we could learn from them. When I first met these people I hadn’t been planning to publish a book, so before going further with this I needed to go back to touch base with them in person and ask for permission to write about them, their beliefs, and practices. I was able to do that with four of them, and in two of those cases wound up getting more information than I had before, so I’m pretty satisfied on that account.

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Crystal Blanton Returns For Sacred Harvest Festival “RJ” Circle – Interview

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Crystal Blanton

Crystal Blanton is returning to Sacred Harvest Festival,  Aug 6-12th.  She is bringing her whole family to experience the festival, and is offering a second  Restorative Justice Circle as a service.  Harmony Tribe is facilitating community participation by non-registrants of the festival  for this event, Thursday, Aug. 9th, 10am at the festival site in Geneva, Mn. I talked to her by phone:

You are back at Sacred Harvest Festival (SHF) ?

Crystal: Yes, I had such a good time last year and I made such incredible connections with people that I really, really wanted to go back, and I wanted to share that experience with my family. I knew that if I could make it happen, I would.

Are you familiar with SHF Guest, Yeshe Rabbit?

We are both in the Bay area, and have had a great connection with each other as we both have continued to grow along our paths. I am really excited that she is one of the national guests this year. I think she will give the festival a great service. I visit her store often. I don’t work within her coven, but because we both are in the Bay area and do leadership type programs we come across each other frequently. We have been able to develop a great working relationship and friendship together even though we don’t work in the same coven.

Crystal at SHF 2011
with Bear Eared Hat

You are offering another Restorative Justice Circle  (RJ) at SHF, why a second one?

Usually when we do an RJ circle around a particular topic there is a follow-up. We do that as a means to make sure that after the first interaction that people have had the opportunity to be a part of the solution and deal with whatever has come up since the initial engagement. In this kind of scenario, my thought was to come back and offer that same kind of opportunity for people to engage in a follow-up but to also focus on some community building type exercises supporting the community with moving forward and gaining more tools as a community in that rebuilding process. This is the benefit for participating if you participated last year, to support going from one phase to the next phase of healing and restoring community values.

What if this is your first RJ experience, what would be the benefit?

As I am designing this my initial plan will likely change once I connect with the community. There is always what we think we want to do, and then once there, what is needed. My guess is that it would have a portion set aside to talk about the past year, and the feelings and emotions associated with the rebuilding of community. I want to focus more on that direction, but that is just based on impressions of what I left a year ago. Since this will be open to community, it also depends on who decides to participate and attends. Part of the RJ process, that can be both challenging and important, is to be able to move within the needs of the community which we are serving at that moment. Because I don’t know what portion of the HT community will be participating, I have to leave that somewhat open at this time. There will be time to get some basic feelings out, but my main push will be to get to the next phase of restoring.

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