Air Date: Week of July 31, 2020

The Kiowa Gourd Dance ceremony usually is performed in a circle with a drum placed at the center. Men beat the drums and women stand or sit behind them. Both sing and dance in place, raising their feet in synchronicity with the drumbeats and swinging metal rattles from side to side. (Photo: Donovan Shortey, Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0)

The Natural Sounds and Night Skies Division of the National Park Service has compiled hundreds of sounds from parks all over the country. In this recording, members of the Kiowa Nation of the southern Great Plains sing traditional Buffalo Songs.

Transcript

CURWOOD: The Natural Sounds and Night Skies Division of the National Park Service has compiled more than 150 sounds from parks all over the country.

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CURWOOD: In this recording members of the Kiowa Nation of the southern Great Plains sing the Buffalo Songs, traditionally rendered at the end of the Kiowa Gourd Clan ceremony.
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CURWOOD: The ceremony comes from a legend in which a Kiowa warrior encountered a red wolf who was dancing and singing this song. The wolf encouraged the warrior to share the song with his people.

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CURWOOD: The songs were identified by Dennis Zotigh, the Cultural Specialist at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian.

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