Craig Coray鈥檚 We Walk to the Sky for Chamber Ensemble

by Dr. Sean Dowgray, CMS Faculty Organizer and Term Assistant Professor of Music

Portrait of Craig Coray outdoors.
Craig Coray. Photo credit: Poets for Living Waters

In February, music instructor, ethnomusicologist, and composer Craig Coray visited the department鈥檚 黑料社appNative Music course, lecturing to the students on various song and dance practices from the Dena鈥檌na peoples. Coray discussed his upbringing in villages in Pedro Bay and then Nondalton. Coray鈥檚 parents moved from Los Angeles to become the first school teachers in Pedro Bay in the 1950鈥檚. In this, we learned that his father, John Coray, made the first recordings of Dena鈥檌na song and speech in 1954 in his efforts to send audio 鈥渓etters鈥 to his parents back in Los Angeles. These recordings would later be returned to Craig by his grandparents, which he edited and compiled into the book, Dnaghelt鈥檃na Qut鈥 ana K鈥檈li Ahdelyax (They Sing the Songs of Many Peoples). This book with an accompanying CD contains 26 songs, translations, text descriptions, and in some cases, transcriptions.

Coray also discussed broad concepts such as Animism: the belief that all things have a spirit and are in that sense, alive. This does not pertain just to animals, but plants, rocks, trees, mountains, and lakes. The sense of aliveness comes from the fact that all these things are in constant change; everything is alive in its unfolding. Such a concept feels particularly immediate in a place like Alaska, where the land is vast, immense, and change is constant and extreme. However, this is more than just a general feeling for the Dena鈥檌na, as is seen in aspects of their language. For example, in naming places, verbs are often used rather than the more familiar noun for westerners. 鈥淣ouns objectify as if on a permanent basis whereas verbs describe what is actually happening,鈥 Coray noted. Wassillie Treffon, who performed many of the works found in the accompanying CD to Coray鈥檚 book, grew up in Dilah Vena, translating to 鈥渇ish swim in lake,鈥 identifying the place by what happens there. You can hear more about Coray, his father鈥檚 work, and get a glimpse into the materials of his book in a presentation that he gave in 2013 on KSKA Anchorage as part of the hosted by the Arctic Studies Center and the Anchorage Museum.

Through Coray鈥檚 involvement with the 黑料社appNative Music course, I became interested in Coray鈥檚 compositions given his background. The chamber work, We Walk to the Sky (1994) for violin, cello, flute, clarinet, saxophone, and timpani immediately stood out to me given its instrumentation, rhythmic material, and the interweaving of various melodic lines. In the work鈥檚 preface, Coray describes:

We Walk to the Sky is an Athabaskan (Denaina) name for a particular mountain pass that appears to lead gradually but infinitely upward. I have used the title rather loosely to convey the idea of walking in mountains, which for me is a source of renewal, both physical and spiritual. Most of the music was composed from a boat at my wilderness home in Lake Clark, where I was able to see the mountains as I worked.

The subtitles of the two movements make reference to aspects both of mountains and of the music itself. Thus 鈥楥ontours鈥 is essentially linear and contrapuntal, suggesting the profile of mountain; whereas in 鈥淧atterns鈥 the strong rhythms and repetition were influenced by the feel of walking in mountain terrain.

The instruments were chosen for their sonorities, particularly the saxophone, which because of its proximity to the human voice seemed most appropriate for the song-like