Dragonfly Gala on August 13, 2016

Dragonfly Lecture on February 22nd

Concert: Traditional and New Music from Southern California Indian Nations

Georgiana Sanchez has a gift for you. She drove a very long way to share her beautiful stories and poems at the January 23 Native Voices Poetry Festival. Today, Sunday, January 24, she is turning around and commuting many miles again. She and her family will sing and tell traditional and new Chumash songs and stories at a benefit concert. Dorothy Ramon Learning Center is so grateful that this Elder is honoring our nonprofit this way. Please come and support, 3 p.m. at 127 N. San Gorgonio Avenue, Banning, and accept her gift of beautiful songs and stories from the Chumash culture. Sean Milanovich will share beautiful songs he wrote in Cahuilla. Ernest Siva, Bill Bell & Don Strandberg also will share traditional songs. Your $10 will help Dorothy Ramon Learning Center save and share Southern California's cultures, languages, history, and arts. 

Photo by Carlos Puma for Dorothy Ramon Learning Center

Storytelling at Banning's Art Festival

Sharing Chumash Stories and Songs

CHUMASH SINGERS

Songs and Stories

with

Georgiana Sanchez, Susan Diaz, Patricia Estrada

Sunday, August 26, 2012, 3:00 pm

San Manuel Gathering Hall 

at Dorothy Ramon Learning Center

127 N. San Gorgonio Ave., Banning, CA

Come hear stories and songs of the Chumash Indians of the Santa Barbara area and the Channel Islands! Hear a language that was almost lost and meet some people responsible for saving and restoring it. Join us for this special experience.

$10 admission helps support the programs of the Center

Singing & Storytelling for The Center

Our Fourth Sunday cross-cultural concert series so far has taken us on a musical journey across the seas, to different continents and diverse cultures. 

We traveled with the fiddle music of Bill Bell to the lands and ballads of his ancestors. We enjoyed the Silver Sounds flute chorus and the inspiring Celtic-themed odes to our natural world on Earth Day. 

Our most recent concert with GG & the Jazz Masters took us to our American history with some old jazz favorites and some foot-tapping swing and Big Band numbers much appreciated by our audience. 

Now we're coming Home. 

Photo by Carlos Puma for The Center

Our next Fourth Sunday concert, scheduled for 3-5 p.m. ... yes, the fourth Sunday in June — June 24 — will feature our own Ernest Siva, President and Founder of Dorothy Ramon Learning Center.

Mr. Siva is Cahuilla/Serrano, and he brings a lifetime of learning and sharing Southern California Native American cultures and traditional music. It will be a thrill to hear his voice, and the voices of his Native American flutes, in the beautiful acoustics of our Center's San Manuel Band of Serrano Mission Indians Gathering Hall at 127 N. San Gorgonio Ave., Banning. 

Look forward to singing and storytelling. 

Photo by Carlos Puma for The Center

Mr. Siva says:

"I plan to sing a variety of Serrano and Cahuilla songs with their stories and educational information. I will use the flute to illustrate how these songs can be used for personal enjoyment. 

"Some of the songs will include: lullabies that teach lessons, hunting songs that aren't used anymore for hunting, but are beautiful songs to sing and remind us of our relationship to animals, such as the bighorn sheep and the deer; bird songs that tell of our coming to this world and the wonder of creation, and examples of special songs of some of our neighbors, the Chumash and Luiseño."

Photo by Carlos Puma for The Center

Your $10 at the door will help the Center do its important nonprofit work of saving and sharing Southern California's Native American cultures, languages, history and traditional arts such as music. 
See you soon!

Art Hop Springing Into View

Time to start thinking about the Art Hop, Banning's annual downtown cross-cultural arts event. This year it's May 1. But we're celebrating cultural arts the whole weekend!

A few of our planned activities:

American Indian Music Workshops

Flute-Making Workshop, April 30, May 1 & 2

Make a beautiful wooden six-holed Plains-style Native American flute in a 3-day workshop with master flute-maker Marvin Yazzie, Navajo, and his wife, Jonette. Learn the basics of playing with Ernest Siva. Discover the music of the First People of Southern California. Limited to 10. $300.

Pre-register siva@dishmail.net, 951.849.4676.

Art Hop Workshops, May 1

• Clappersticks

Chumash culture bearers Georgiana Sanchez and her family will teach how to make this ancient wooden musical instrument, then share and teach songs and stories important to the Chumash people. Decorate a clapperstick to take home. Sessions limited to 15 people. $20. Pre-register siva@dishmail.net, 951.849.4676

• Rattles for kids

Kids can learn how to make a tin-can rattle and about appropriate use. FREE as long as supplies last!

Discover The Center at Hays & San Gorgonio, Banning

OPEN HOUSE! Help Dorothy Ramon Learning Center, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit,

Save & Share Southern California’s cultures, history, languages, & traditional arts.

Voices of the Flute

Mountaintop Music and Arts

The rising temperatures remind us that summer is coming, and so is the annual Native American arts festival on the (cooler) mountaintop in Idyllwild. 

Every July, aspiring flute-makers  explore the creative and inspirational  Native American flute workshop at Idyllwild Arts with Marvin Yazzie (Navajo) and his wife, Jonette, and Ernest Siva, president and founder of Dorothy Ramon Learning Center. 

The Yazzies teach how to make a beautiful wooden flute in the Plains style.

Ernest Siva (Cahuilla/Serrano) then teaches the basics of flute-playing. He shares stories and songs from Southern California's Native American nations. 

But much more happens. 

A community forms. People make lasting friendships, discover their inner flute player, and share discoveries and the wonder of our region's Native American music.

Discovering Voices

Our Voices of the Flute book and CD, our first publication from Ushkana Press, got its start on that mountaintop.

Each year, Ernest Siva shared a handmade, hand-written, photocopied, stapled-together work with the students that this Indian elder had entitled as a spoof, "Ten Little Indian Songs and More."

 

Much, Much More

Ernest Siva had written western music notations for this centuries-old music. It was the first time anyone had done this. He also wrote down the words in Indian for the songs. In some cases, Ernest Siva was the lone, known remaining Native American singer who was singing these ancient songs. Sharing them with the flute workshop was a way of saving them.

Saving and Sharing

When Dorothy Ramon Learning Center formed to save and share Southern California's Native American cultures, languages, history, and music and other traditional arts, publishing this work seemed not just a natural, but instead, a responsibility. Ushkana Press, the 501(c)(3) nonprofit's publishing arm, took on the project. 

But the title?

June Siva, Ernest's wife,  simply said: "Voices of the Flute."

Subtitle: "Songs of Three Southern California Indian Nations."

In the Chumash stories that have been passed down to us from J.P. Harrington, there is a Lizard who plays a flute.

He plays his flute to listen to the Voice of the World.

Each of these songs is the voice of a culture, a people.

Each time we listen, we can discover something new from something that is very old.

Art Hopping

The Art Hop in downtown Banning was a great success. Our workshops with traditional Native American music instruments were fun and informative. Read about the entire event here.

Make Music at the Art Hop

Scene from 2008 free tin-can rattle workshop,

Photo by Pat Murkland

UPDATED APRIL 9

Banning's annual Art Hop will be here April 25. Many events are free or affordable and family-friendly. Check out the 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. calendar chock full of activities at the Banning Cultural Alliance, the lead sponsor.

Last year more than 3,000 people celebrated a day of amazing cross-cultural arts events in downtown Banning, and Dorothy Ramon Learning Center was indeed in the Center of it all.

This year, we again are offering special events that save and share Southern California's American Indian music and other arts. We are proud to announce that Banning Unified School District's American Indian Education Program will co-sponsor our Art Hop workshops:

In the A.M.

CLAPPERSTICKS with Georgiana Sanchez and including family members Sue and Ray Diaz, and Patricia Estrada, Chumash culture bearers.

Limited to 15 people. $20 per person; all proceeds benefit Dorothy Ramon Learning Center, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. Learn about these traditional rhythm instruments that accompany song and dance. When struck against the palm, we hear a clacking, clapping sound. Decorate a bamboo clapperstick to take home with designs possibly from traditional stories or baskets. Learn about Chumash culture from traditional culture bearers. Share in a songfest and learn fun and easy songs to sing while you play your clapperstick. Some interesting kelp seaweed rattles and other unique music instruments will be on display.  Make sure you get in; pre-registration encouraged, siva@dishmail.net. We encourage teachers and parents to participate in this workshop purposely kept small. 

Don't miss their FREE onstage performance scheduled for 1 p.m. Here they are last year, with fellow singer June Siva (in Trojan red). Photo by Pat Murkland.

TIN CAN RATTLES FOR KIDS. FREE!

Kids learn how to make a tin-can rattle to take home and learn about the rattle's appropriate use in Southern California music. Presenters: Banning schools Indian Club members.

In the AFTERNOON.

GOURD RATTLE WORKSHOP with Gerald Clarke Jr., Cahuilla artist. 

Bird songs and other traditional music are accompanied by these beautiful-sounding instruments made from gourds. Learn how to make one to take home, while also learning the respectful use of the rattle accompanying traditional music. $30. Enrollment limited. Pre-registration encouraged, siva@dishmail.net. For teens and adults. Proceeds will benefit Dorothy Ramon Learning Center.

Gerald Clarke, Jr. teaching the 2008 workshop

Photo by Pat Murkland

Meanwhile, our annual NATIVE AMERICAN FLUTE WORKSHOP with Marvin and Jonette Yazzie will run a three-day weekend, from April 24-26. 

In this workshop starting at 9 a.m. Friday, each student will construct and decorate a six-hole wooden flute under the guidance of Marvin Yazzie, experienced Navajo flute maker, and his wife, Jonette. Students will also learn some history of flutes as well as the care and handling of their newly created instrument. During the course, ethnomusicologist Ernest Siva, president and founder of Dorothy Ramon Learning Center, will teach the basics of flute playing and each student will receive a copy of Voices of the Flute book and CD (Ushkana Press). You do need to sign up ahead of time, enrollment is already filling fast. The price is $300. A portion of the proceeds will benefit the Learning Center.

Click here to see scenes from the Yazzies' similar flute class at Idyllwild Arts.

All events will be at Dorothy Ramon Learning Center, 17 West Hays, Banning.

Watch for more events, we're going to be adding some free family fun!