Who’s Next?: A Music Review e-zine
Reviewed by Sylvie Harris, President of Alpha Music Group
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Robert Windpony
MoonRider – Native American Flute Music
Visit Robert Windpony at website.
When I as given the opportunity to review Robert Windpony’s MoonRider, I felt immediately energized.
Call it a coincidence, but just yesterday I was reading about Native American culture and earth-based spirituality and I felt a whole new world opening. In my reading, I was literally transformed to a place where all things are spiritual and connected. I was transformed to a place of healing. Today, in listening to Robert Windpony’s MoonRider, I was given the same gift of transformation.
From the very first breath, the very first note, I knew that there was more to life than what most of us experience and you can find this gift in Robert Windpony's music.
Robert Windpony plays his spirit songs in traditional Native American style. This means there are no electronically created sounds or artificial instruments. Have you ever heard a new-age CD that mimics the ocean? You are not really hearing the ocean. You can not feel the salt, the breeze, the true nature of the waves. What you are hearing is a computer loop that may be relaxing, but lacks authenticity.
At some point, deep in your gut – you know that the experience isn’t the real ocean. It’s just a computer recording thats trying to sound like an ocean.
So when Robert Windpony’s CD landed on my desk, I became genuinely excited about hearing something ‘real.’
Robert feels that his playing is guided by spirit and that his flute playing gives voice to his spirit songs. He receives inspiration from his journeys in the deserts, high plateaus and mountains of the southwest. In his recordings, there is no wall between nature and music - they co-exist - creating a voice that is whole and interconnected. Robert Windpony is not a copy. He is alive in his music. He is in the moment and he takes you with him on a spiritual journey that is hauntingly gorgeous.
Before I discuss my review of his album MoonRider, I would like to talk a little about Robert’s medium – the Native American Flute. Robert is clearly a virtuoso of the instrument. Native American flutes are often called courting flutes which explains one of their functions. North American Indian tribes also used the flutes to produce dance music for their ceremonies and festivals.
The tone or pitch of ancient flutes was determined by the size of the tree branch from which it was made along with the spacing of the holes. The early flutes were made from the juniper family of trees including cedar. Today flutes are made of these same woods plus cherry, redwood, ash, walnut, spruce and many exotic domestic and imported woods.
In preparing my review for this CD, I was already moved by the vision of the beautifully crafted wooden instrument and by a musician who freely states that his music is guided by spirit.
The first song I played was called Sante Fe Trails.
I have never been to the Sante Fe Trails and it doesn’t matter because from the very first note, I gathered that this piece of music was more than a specific place in nature. The sound of the Native American Flute is beautiful and in Robert’s care the notes come together to form a composition that is like taking a very deep breath. Sante Fe Trails is beautiful. It is peaceful. It speaks of Earth, Air, Water, Mountains and it speaks without words. The music feels circular in that the structures are not linear or predictable, yet there is still structure in the same way that there is structure in breathing the air.
The next gem I had the privilege to listen to was called “Canyonlands.”
In Canyonlands the opening is an echoe.
A simple melody is stated and then repeated, but nothing Robert does is a repeat. Even the echoe is original in composition reminding you that Robert is not composing at a table with a computer – he is playing something that is alive and in life no two things are identical. Every note of this CD is important to the next note and the note before it; each note has it's moment and Robert's master technique of the instrument allows him to let each note be alive.
The music in this piece is sweeping like the wind in and out of a valley. The sound is almost sighing at times as the Native American Flute, although stated to have five notes, actually has a lot of notes in between called microtones and these microtones take you out of the ordinary 12-step scale and into a new culture.
In Canyonlands, I felt as though I was standing very tall and overlooking something very beautiful…something in the distance that I was calling to and yet, it was also calling to me.
I continued to let Robert’s music play and the more I listened, the more I loved it. This music transcends the boundaries of time and space. It almost floats. There is a sense of the past in the deeply longing tones. And there is a sense of flight, moving forward. The Native American Flute in Robert’s hands almost sounds like a soulful bird. It glides in the air and lands on the earth softly. It is beautiful, sometimes haunting and always peaceful. The journey is always authentic.
On his website, Roberts states that his music is relaxing.
I would state that it is more than relaxing. It is transforming.
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