I updated a little the flute related art gallery on my website,
by adding a page number twelve:

http://fallenbranch.com/fluteart12.html

...And also, someone shared generously a few more pics of old native american flute players:

http://fallenbranch.com/oldplayers3.html

Enjoy !

I have always been fascinated with old photos and never tire of looking at them. Thank you for sharing these wonderful old pictures! An incredible slice of history.

Yes indeed, these old pics are really moving.
One question for all:
Did anyone have a pic of Richard Fool Bull ?
He was a great Lakota flutemaker, and I can't find a lot of infos about him.

Those are amazing... you make me want to pull out my old airbrush now...
I was especially facinated by the photo of the little girl playing the flute. I was under the impression woman couldn't play flutes back in the day, but this photo seems to contradict that.

Dale thank you so much for making those photo's available!! I was moved looking at them.

JJ I think there are some pieces of information about various cultural things that are not public. Difficult for there to be one blanket rule governing womens roles when there are so many Nations/cultures to consider...

Yup... and that photo definitly proves you're right.

Jim, lots of these kinds of pics are posed big time, man. In Ed Curtiss' stuff, you can often see the same Wapaha, "Warbonnet" or Shirt, or Breastplate, make the rounds from "tribe" to "tribe".

Hau! This reminds me of Jasper Blowsnake. Jasper Blowsnake has some wicked flute playing examples around, also This Picture Of Him as well as Stories he shared. Deep stuff, those Stories, if anybody feels like googling him, your commonstanding of Things will assuredly Grow.
Toksa.

Very nice, Dale.
Thank you so much.

That is absolutely true.

Photographers have always tended to "stage" their images. No matter how natural and "honest" an image might look, in all probability, if it is a "pro" image, it has been manipulated to some degree. (I actually can't imagine, making images without exercising control over them.)

On the other hand, if you tried taking photos of ordinary people, doing ordinary things (irregardless of how historically correct that might be), no one would be interested in seeing them.

Actually, my eye says the photo of the girl with the flute, was posed, entirely, and the girl did not play the flute.

On the other hand, the photos of Laurance, were probably somewhat genuine, as he spent much time trying to document the flute music of native people.

Love the art of Guillermo, also. The hummingbird is probably an artist's signature touch, in it. (Once did juried show photos for an artist, whose signature feature was a blue feather, concealed into the art somewhere.)

Yes you are true. What a man.
But it's hard to find a pic of him. I mean, I remember I found several pics of him,
and it was obvious it was not the same man.
(I am not sure where it was, but it could be on this same "Wisconsin historical society" website).
This morning I found another pic of him, even more different (if this pic is right, what a tall man !):

Wow. I would say this aint the same guy in the pic I posted, enit? Makes you wonder about things. One thing I know, "the boys" where hustling then, as they do now, and Wisconsin has always been a destination for "Indian" seekers, cause of the pageant thing they put on in the Dells. So, I wonder if there were more than one "Jasper Blowsnake" lol. Just like Denise's dad, Tim Giago, had a pic he thought was Crazy Horse, but it was an Oglala named Stabber. He thought it real cause of Ben Black Elk's accompanying letter, written in Lakota, from like th e30's, saying it was Crazy Horse. lol.

I really think Crazy horse was never photographed in any way.

By the way James, I think i could add an art page just showing yours.
You made so much wonderful siyotanka paintings over these years.
Would you agree ?

I wasn't so sure they were all different people. The photo showing one seated younger man could be the same guy as the tall older guy in the other photo. There are similarities in the jawline, cheeks and eyes. Could be the same person 30 years older and 40 pounds heavier. I know none of my old high school friends are recognizable now. Time does strange things to people.

The photo with 3 or 4 people in it doesn't have that same person in it. If you read that caption carefully it names several people who could have been the people in the photo, but it didn't say they were actually in it. I think it listed more names than people. My impression was that Jasper Blowsnake could have been one of the people but he wasn't necessarily in the photo.

Then again, I've been known to give fake names myself when strangers ask and I don't trust them. Maybe "Jasper Blowsnake" was the first name that popped into their heads when the photographer showed up.

You are so true, it's amazing how people can change during their life.
This said, while the pictures from the Wisconson historical society stay mysterious,
I think the one I found showing the older Jasper Blowsnake along Frank Speck has some chance to be real,
cause this same mr Speck made several recordings of Jasper playing the flute.
I am trying to figure how to find and hear these recordings.

After many researchs, I found many, many pics of Jasper Blowsnake.
Mainly on Wisconsin Dells old postcards from the 40s. This place was a touristic attraction, and Jasper was present there.
He's clearly identified on various postcards.

...So, the pic shown above looks really true, cause the pics I found really show the same person,
and moreover he's along Frank Speck, the man who recorded his flute playing.

....And thus, all of the Wisconsin Historical Society pics look wrong.
Even if we try to imagine Jasper younger, none of them show the same person,
and none of them of show a man like on the postcards.
The photographer probably mixed everything when he wrote his notes...
Or didn't understand what the Ho-chunk guys there told him.

If you want to see the Jasper pics I found, here is a link (I just have a doubt about the third):

https://picasaweb.google.com/ofallenbranch/...feat=directlink

Also, I bought all his recordings (12 in total, from 1937) to the American Philosophical Society.
It's very moving to hear such old flute tunes.
I don't have the right to share them here though, so anyone interested have to buy them too.
Drop me a message and I'll tell you how to do it.

Cool Dale!