Music, Ritual and Cosmology of the Desana and Baniwa People of the Upper Rio Negro, Amazon, Brazil: a Collaborative Research

Abstract

This paper aims to present the connection between the Desana Guahari Diputiro Porã and Baniwa Hohodene mythology and music. The Guahari Diputiro Porã sib originally lived along the banks of the Papuri River, a branch of the Uaupés River, in the Upper Rio Negro region. Nowadays, some people of the sib live in a small city called Iauaretê. The large Baniwa phratries called the Hohodene and the Walipere-dakenai live on the Içana River and its principal tributary, the Aiary. The mythology and musical repertoires are shared by these groups in different versions. The research was based on dialogues with a bayá, a chant specialist, in São Gabriel da Cachoeira and Iauareté. The research was also based on a long-term relation with the pajés (shamans) of the Aiary River. Through interviews, tape-recordings and filming of healing sessions, and over three decades of learning about the Hohodene traditions, it shows the fundamental connection between collective identity, the sacred musical instruments, the mythology of origin of the clans, the dynamic process of creating and transmitting identity through music over the generations, and the collaborative ethnomusicological research process established among indigenous communities, research institutes, and NGOs. This work also presents aspects of the human origin through performance of the musical repertoire and rite. First the creation myths and the sacred flutes will be presented, followed by a description of the main Desana and Baniwa musical repertoires; some of them appeared at the same time as humans at the “Transformation Houses” –portals to the spiritual dimension of origins.