March 4th For Standing Rock NYC
Some scenes from yesterday’s march through Midtown Manhattan in support of Standing Rock. I spoke in front of the main branch of the NYPL on Fifth Avenue & 42nd Street about multiple pipelines afflicting Turtle Island, the Ramapough Lunaape Split Rock Sweetwater Prayer Camp & the role of my fellow musicians in this resistance. I was also later interviewed by BuzzFeed on the approach to Columbus Circle. Video to follow. Despite the cold, we had a pretty good turnout & the freewheelin’ jazz band held us down, dancing at the rear of the column. ‘Twas another great day to be indigenous & help spread awareness – A’ho*
(All photographs by Kandia Crazy Horse unless indicated)
(Eagle Woman o’er my right shoulder & Kandia Crazy Horse w/ her handmade sign @ NYPL Fifth Avenue & 42nd St before the speakers & march)
I Still Stand With Standing Rock #NoDAPL
There may be a new administration in Washington & they are obviously in cahoots with the corporations behind the #KeystoneXL & the #DakotaAccessPipeline — but we of Indian Country & our allies are still determined to stop all black snakes from afflicting Turtle Island. I have received communication from LaDonna Brave Bull Allard of Sacred Stone Camp & others to come stand with our precious water protectors @ Standing Rock — or to organize actions locally to support them. I am pondering the latter with my fellow Afro-Native bandmate of Cactus Rose & some of my Tri-State Native Circle. We all must do our part, when they are raiding camps & dishonoring rights. We cannot let this stand. And I shall still be acting in support of the Ramapough Lunaape @ Split Rock with their efforts to #StopSpectra here in NY/NJ/CT. See you on the frontlines! A’ho*
HAPPY NEW YEAR & #NoDAPL 2017!
Happy New Year, y’all & best wishes as the seasons unfold. I hope you had a grand ole holiday time; for my part, I finally got some much needed rest & a spell to rotate some albums of 2016 — especially country releases — that I never got to hear during the course of last year. We of Cactus Rose are taking some time to conjure, connect culturally & write songs during January & then we will be doing two shows on the Brooklyn Country scene in February. I will be making my first live appearances of 2017 in upstate New York & in Connecticut — the latter being a major event I am not yet at liberty to share details about. Stay tuned to this page &
…In the meanwhile: hope can rope yer hearts to join Jonathan Demme & myself @ the Jacob Burns Film Center in Pleasantville, NY next Saturday for his western movies screening series / live event “Saddle Up Saturdays.” I will serve as the guest artist / interlocutor for the presentation of Dixie lore & Lakota-themed Run Of The Arrow starring Rod Steiger, Brian Keith & Charles Bronson — followed by a discussion + Q&A. The screening will be preceded by Jonathan’s Standing Rock documentary: Protection Not Protest: The People of Standing Rock
Neither I nor my fellow bandmates in Cactus Rose, Jeff & Kimberly/KAR, have forgotten about Standing Rock or Split Rock, despite the switch in focus to Aleppo or the trend hoppers moving on to the next new thing; and we remain committed to helping stop all the black snakes threatening Turtle Island. So this event will be a good opportunity to come and hear about the Split Rock actions & other causes of Indian Country as well as how it was for me to grow up Indian loving the western genre & cowboy music in the Vietnam Era when antiheroes dominated horse operas while there was a revival of Native American consciousness in the real world beyond celluloid. A’ho*
#IStandWithStandingRock
Tix & more information available here: RUN OF THE ARROW w/ KANDIA CRAZY HORSE 1/14 @ noon JACOB BURNS FILM CENTER
Rebel Music In The Hour Of Chaos: protest music concert @ Decolonize This Place NYC 12/12
“Rebel Music In The Hour Of Chaos:” Music emanates directly from my indigenous soul. Therefore, it immediately made sense for me to perform my music again this year as a soundtrack to our overlapping struggles – including #NoDAPL. Sounds, including freedom songs past & present, most powerfully link us together & amplify what’s transpiring from the actions in the streets. I was born in the Season of Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going’ On,” an album that dominated my childhood as the strivings for Total Revolution continued past the 1960s societal upheaval; and the inspiration to become an artist-activist sprang from that era. I remain under the influence of rebel music from many artists and cultures – Please join us on Monday 12 December @ Decolonize This Place. 55 Walker St, TriBeCa NYC (Doors 8pm). when we will perform some songs of protest & be in conversation about our activism with Brotha Rob Fields (Bold As Love / Black Rock Coalition) – A’ho! Cactus Rose ft. Special Guests: Abiodun Oyewole (The Last Poets) & Mahina Movement
This may be our final show of 2016, so we really appreciate you coming through & all of your support during the many Standing Rock resistance actions – Wopila tanka, y’all
( Afro-Native sisterhood from Virginia: Kimberly Robison/KAR & Kandia Crazy Horse of Cactus Rose, Native Americana / cosmic country band, @ Decolonize This Place in TriBeCa this past Sunday for Black Art & Activism Now, curated by Dr. Camara Holloway & Tavia Nyong’o (Yale University) )
( preliminary poster for REBEL MUSIC IN THE HOUR OF CHAOS by artist Kyle Goen (Decolonize This Place/MTO Collective) #KyleDidThis )
( Jeff McLaughlin, lead guitarist / vocals of Cactus Rose )
( Kandia Crazy Horse with Lorena, Vaimoana & Gabby of Mahina Movement @ Decolonize This Place NYC )
( Kandia Crazy Horse & Abiodun Oyewole of The Last Poets – Cactus Rose Instagram: @cactusroselovesyou )
Kandia Crazy Horse x Democracy Now! 20 in NYC
Last night in Harlem, I attended the Democracy Now 20th anniversary celebration @ Riverside Church – by the grace & generosity of my filmmaker friend Jonathan (his footage from the past long weekend @ Standing Rock may be on the Tavis Smiley show tonight on PBS). This photograph is from just after I sang “This Land Is Your Land” in the nave @ Riverside with Tom Morello (Rage Against The Machine). They’d been spinning Woody Guthrie before the event & I reckon a Steve Earle version of the tune. I had been musing deeply on Woody, Pete Seeger, Madiba, my honorary uncle Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichael)’s funeral in the same space & that MLK Jr denounced the Vietnam War from that pulpit. Singing in this sanctified Harlem space by the Hudson riverside got me fired up for next week’s rebel music program @ Decolonize #AllPowerToThePeople #CactusRose #KandiaCrazyHorse #artist #activist #indigenousrevolutionary #DemocracyNow20 #SingOut!!!
( Tom Morello by Kandia Crazy Horse )
Another photo from “Celebrate 20 Years of Democracy Now!” that Gina Belafonte sent me during the event. Although they knew each other previously, this was the first time Noam Chomsky & Harry Belafonte shared a platform according to him. What I loved best about Uncle Harry’s portion: he referred to Standing Rock & remade the call to Obama — as per my own wish throughout Walking Eagle’s presidency — to pardon Leonard Peltier. Accompanied by Democracy Now‘s footage @ Standing Rock & other indigenous resistance actions including those of Idle No More, I felt good to have our issues addressed on the date of the camps’ eviction (5 December). This discussion with the icons plus show hosts Amy Goodman & Juan Gonzalez occurred right before Patti Smith took the stage with a guitarist & her daughter Jesse on piano (a generational sonic nurturing I was glad to bear witness to as a female singer-songwriter & activist) to sing a forceful rendition of “People Got The Power” to a standing ovation.
( Noam Chomsky & Harry Belafonte sharing a platform for the first time – Democracy Now 20 @ Riverside Church in Harlem, by Gina Belafonte )
I am grateful I got to attend the event, be inspired by the speakers including Danny Glover & Danny DeVito, and, impromptu, be invited to sing a song for the people by one of our most hallowed American artist-activist icons, Woody Guthrie. Still musing on the takeaway from this celebration & will be sure to express it at my own protest music conversation/concert next week in Manhattan. Please join us in TriBeCa on the evening of 12/12 – We The People have many more reasons now in the Americas to #SingOut!!!
A’ho*
( Kandia Crazy Horse, singer/songwriter/indigenous activist of Cactus Rose, Native Americana / country music band, @ Riverside Church in Manhattan, after Democracy Now 20 )
Standing With Standing Rock #mniwiconi #NoDAPL #defendthesacred
Just returned a bit earlier from my twin Camara’s #blackartandactivismnow event in TriBeCa @ our home away from home #DecolonizeThisPlace — fortunately, my Black Rock Coalition/Bold As Love good friend/compadre Rob Fields was seated by me at the program, sharing the digital smoke signals about the #NoDAPL good news with me during the panel & then, upon returning home, got a ring from my friend Jonathan from the camps @ the frontline in North Dakota giving the confirmation that the easement was not granted to ETA – if they git’er done, Jonathan’s footage will appear on the Tavis Smiley show on PBS Tuesday night. I finally truly believe in the power of prayer, happy to see such a great outcome after many months of organizing, laboring, marching, rallying & of course, singing, in support of #StandingRock.
Yet this is not the end, for we #blacksnakekillers of the Tri-State must be heartened by this result & continue to fight to #StopSpectra #NoAIM #NoAlgonquinPipeline & I remain #standinginsolidaritywithsplitrock >>>>>>>—–))—>♥ Sometimes we on the right side of history can prevail & conscience trumps greed and corruption. Thank you, President Barack H. “Walking Eagle” Obama & the Army Corps for your action!
Overjoyed that we water protectors have won! The Dakota Access Pipeline will be re-routed, which is a hard-won victory for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe & rest of the Oceti Sakowin. The ordered environmental impact statement will take months to complete, so it’s not all over & done yet. Still, we celebrate this huge victory & I will report back on the gnosis and mood of tomorrow night’s Democracy Now! event held by Harry Belafonte & Danny Glover et al @ Harlem’s Riverside Church – A’ho!
ARMY HALTS CONSTRUCTION OF DAKOTA ACCESS PIPELINE!
Throwback Thursday: Cactus Rose x Mahina Movement
Here’s a snap by youngblood Claude from last night @ Decolonize This Place, just before the sistren of protest music trio Mahina Movement sang a mighty powerful song In The Spirit of 1491. Contributing some guest vocals — impromptu, I joined them on singing “Ella’s Song” by Sweet Honey In The Rock, and some other tunes — & bearing witness to the live recording of their album for Palestine was a great way to end Native American Heritage Month.
(L-R) Kandia Crazy Horse, singer/songwriter/activist of Cactus Rose; Mahina Movement: Lorena Ambrosio (vocals, cajon, spoken word), Vaimoana Litia Makakaufaki Niumeitolu (vocals, spoken word) & Gabby (vocals, guitar), activists
We be #strongresilientindigenous & we’re looking forward to performing together come 12 December, back @ Decolonize in TriBeCa – A’ho!
#womenwarriorwednesdays #femalesingersongwriters #artists #activists #indigenousrevolutionaries #tbt #NoDAPL #FreePalestine
Still Standing In Solidarity With Standing Rock #mniwiconi #NoDAPL
As I have been these many months, I continue to be engaged in the Dakota Access Pipeline resistance in solidarity with the Oceti Sakowin of North Dakota – & now, supporting Split Rock as well (sanctioned by Red Warrior Camp), in solidarity with my cousin’s wife’s people, the Ramapough Lunaape of New Jersey, in order to stop the construction of the Algonquin Pipeline. Due to the escalation of attacks on the water protectors @ Standing Rock last Sunday night, I am receiving many communications on the cause & have now been invited to perform at yet another benefit for the camps, which will take place in NYC before Christmas. Other things are afoot as well & will relate about them as they unfold. Glad to note my Virginia Native great aunt is taking up flooding the phones to the president & state representatives with her circle of elders on behalf of Standing Rock!
( Kandia Crazy Horse, water protector, in Midtown NYC #mniwiconi #NoDAPL #NoAIM #defendthesacred #blacksnakekillers of Turtle Island )
For now, reflecting on having participated in the rally > march for Standing Rock last Wednesday @ Trump Tower in Midtown Manhattan & then performing at the Benefit For Water Protectors of #StandingRock on Friday night — making our debut as Cactus Rose at Brooklyn’s famed Jalopy Theater for ole-timey/hillbilly/folk/mountain music. It was an honor to serve as the headliner for this benefit, with our special guest: Seminole/Shawnee/Mikisúkî singer/songwriter/activist Lonnie Moon Fire Harrington. I have been told by the organizer that the event raised almost $2,000 in donations, so – Wopila tanka to all who came through!
Enjoying these last days of #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth — before band rehearsals resume for our full slate of December performances & attending two events this week for artists I greatly admire: tomorrow’s BET screening of the Sharon Jones documentary (in memoriam) & the private viewing of Morrison Hotel Gallery’s traveling Neil Young exhibit in SoHo on Thursday evening. Looking forward to seeing y’all out-n-about, as well as at the Standing Rock teach-in later this week @ Decolonize This Place – A’ho!
( Cactus Rose, Native Americana/cosmic country band, debut @ Jalopy Theater – pix by Jan Bell of The Maybelles )
Kandia Crazy Horse x Thanksgiving Week #StandingRock actions & benefit concert 11/25 in NYC
Howdy y’all / Osiyo skidoi, all my relations! I have not been able to report back much nor update this site, due to all the many #StandingRock actions & Native American circle pre-thanksgiving ceremonies & events I had over this past weekend & some. Among other events, I sang some of my Native Americana music @ the opening of Urban Native exhibit Cave To The Stars – Urban Natives Unrecognized @ Bread & Roses Project Gallery in Midtown last Thursday; I did #HonoringOurAncestors with the central Harlem Native circle on Saturday, followed by the Thunderbird American Indian Benefit Auction that night on the Upper East Side. And still working on my #LeonRussell memorial article, even as I rehearse for this Friday’s Benefit For Water Protectors concert in Brooklyn @ Jalopy Theater. Ho wa, will share some pix of all this activity by-and-by, but now am learning new songs & also preparing for tomorrow’s Standing Rock action in Midtown – if you somehow missed the horrible news of the chemical weaponry, water cannons & rubber bullets unleashed on the Standing Rock water protectors Sunday night in sub-freezing temperatures & its fallout, now is the time to become aware & join us in these support actions & by donating to the camps. I am receiving many communications suddenly from friends who have been relatively apathetic pre-election & several fellow country / Americana artists now querying me about the Standing Rock resistance; so it will be interesting to see how this continues to unfold & whether President “Walking Eagle” Obama will finally do something definitive in response to these unconscionable attacks on my prayerful relations out West. Still enjoying #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth somewhat — despite the unceasing musical losses: sadly, #SharonJones has walked on, claimed by the same cancer that took my dear mother. This has cast a further pall on the holiday week. A’ho*
Art for tomorrow’s #StandingRock action, by my brotha-in-struggle Kyle Goen #kyledidthis
& a lil’ lighthearted #ThrowbackTuesday snap by #NedSublette of me & my brothas Teddy K aka DJ Soul Punk & Cap’n #KirkDouglas of #TheRoots (the last time I got to see Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings live was @ The Roots Picnic in Philly) @ my live #BlackHillbilly #countryandwestern music series #TheHarlemHonkytonk #SaddleUp!
The Guardian UK on 300 WATER PROTECTORS INJURED AT STANDING ROCK report
Standing Rock National Day of Action #NoDAPL #NoAIM NYC
( Ramapough Lunaape president/chief Dwaine Perry & Kandia Crazy Horse, Native Americana singer-songwriter/activist, of Cactus Rose band @ Central Park, after the Ramapough Lunaape clan mothers’ march in Manhattan )
We of the Eastern Nations in NYC / the Tri-State area are standing in solidarity with Standing Rock today for the National Day of Action. Check your local groups for opportunities to participate. I did prayerful advance marching with the Ramapough Lunaape Nation clan mothers & their Chief Dwaine Perry who came into Manahata from New Jersey on Sunday. We proceeded from Columbus Circle up through Central Park where we held the circle & performed water ceremonies prior to the Supermoon rise. I have been invited to sing in support & be of service at the Ramapough Lunaape water protector camp @ Split Rock in future & look forward to it. Many of us indigenous activists of the NY / NJ / CT area are committed to stopping Spectra, the Algonquin Pipeline, & halting any other pipeline projects that arise in the Northeast. As Sister Davidica Little Spotted Horse of the Oglala Lakota told us last week, the goal is for folks to attend to the black snakes in their own backyard rather than everyone converging on Standing Rock – still we have much to learn from the Oceti Sakowin & remain strong in solidarity with them as they defend The Mother – A’ho* #IStandWithStandingRock & #SplitRock #StandingRockNationalDayOfAction #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth #mniwiconi #NoDAPL #NoAIM #LoveWaterNotOil
Kandia Crazy Horse x Kimberly Robison #KAR on the march of Manahata for Standing Rock #mniwiconi #NoDAPL
Some of the great photography that’s come in from Afro-Native artist & milliner from Texas, Kimberly Robison / KAR. I look forward to performing with her here in NYC next month, as well as being involved with various actions on behalf of Indian Country. When I did the same march up Wickquasgeck back in early August with Brooke & Luis of Eagle & Condor Community Center, there were only 10 of us. So it was heartfelt & illuminating that so many have come to stand in solidarity with Standing Rock in the time since – A’ho*
#mniwiconi #IStandWithStandingRock #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth
(With my fellow NYC artist Cheadah, upon our arrival @ 107th Street)
(In the sage smoke…)
(Kandia by Kimberly / KAR in my “Karen Dalton” hat)
Kandia Crazy Horse x David Archambault II #mniwiconi #NoDAPL #StandingRockSiouxTribe
Between rehearsals for #ProjectAmericana & getting to assorted meetings around NYC, this has been a busy, heady week. Amongst the events I am glad I was able to make time for: Indigenous Forum @ Columbia University. The best part of this was hearing from some of the Oceti Sakowin youth who ran from Cannonball, North Dakota to Washington DC to raise awareness about the Dakota Access Pipeline & related resistance, which I have been engaged in since the dawn of August. Their emotional pleas underscored why we need to keep up our prayers and support for the water protectors at Standing Rock.
(David Archambault II & Kandia Crazy Horse @ Columbia University, NYC)
It was also an honor to hear Standing Rock Sioux Tribe chairman Dave Archambault II speak, including about the long history of predations by the U.S. government & settlers on his Oyate’s sovereign territory and subsequent environmental threats to their lands; and then to get to speak to him briefly about my musical endeavors in Indian Country, as well as specifically on behalf of the water protectors of Standing Rock. Right now, we are watching the live feeds of leaders like LaDonna Allard & others, waiting to see what sadly is happening of the moment in North Dakota. Yet, I still have another musical benefit for Standing Rock in development (in NYC) & am committed to sing in support wherever, whenever may be called. A’ho*
#mniwiconi #NoDAPL #ProtectTheSacred #LoveWaterNotOil #RezpectOurWater #StandingInSolidarityWithStandingRock
Kandia Crazy Horse in The Nation
So, I am off for a meeting with fellow Dakota Access Pipeline Resistance & Algonquin Pipeline folks of NYC to plan for our future actions, including more benefits for the water protectors of the Oceti Sakowin & many other nations. We just sent another bus off full of volunteers and many supplied donations to Standing Rock this past Sunday, so celebrating their road sojourn with them!
Here’s the latest press, from the Indigenous Peoples Day action I did last Monday, which mentions the Standing Rock benefit (Sacred Water Medicine Show) briefly: THE NATION
Enjoy your mid-week!
More Indigenous Day of Remembrance 2016 in NYC
(Kandia Crazy Horse dancing women’s traditional @ Indigenous Day of Remembrance NYC in Central Park, by Kerrie Sansky)
This photo collection & blog by Kerrie Sansky just in, from the Indigenous Day of Remembrance in Manhattan this past Sunday. Features several photos of me & my friends from the Movement:
Blue Eyes Smiling blog on IDOR 2016
Sacred Water Medicine Show in NYC on 10/8 @ 7pm #NoDAPL
Dear Family, Friends, Followers & Folks – Come on out to the Standing Rock benefit concert that I conceived, curated & will perform at on Saturday, October 8th, in Manhattan @ Decolonize This Place, 55 Walker Street, 7pm (doors 6pm), $10 suggested donation. We will be having an evening of indigenous musicians and visual artists coming together with our allied friends from the Brooklyn Country scene to sing, dance, speak about the pipeline resistance & generally raise a joyful noise standing in solidarity with the Standing Rock Oceti Sakowin, united Native nations from across America, and their allies as they winterize to combat the Bakken project afflicting sacred burial sites, the Standing Rock reservation, and lands and water all along the Missouri River.
The featured performers:
Kandia Crazy Horse (Pamunkey)
Ebony Hillbillies (Catawba)
Morgan O’Kane
Alex Battles
Lonnie Harrington (Seminole)
Luis Sanakori Ramos+Band of Tainos (Taino)
& Special Guests including Jana Brownbear, Anastasia McAllister, Bianca Dagga & More
Emcee/speaker: Tina Eagle Woman Johnson of Cherokee Language & Cultural Circle NYC
Facebook evite: Water Is Life – Solidarity Concert
Kandia Crazy Horse (credit: Camara Dia Holloway)
Tina Eagle Woman Johnson (credit: Kandia Crazy Horse)
Henrique Prince of Ebony Hillbillies (@the recent Harlem Hoedown) (credit: Kandia Crazy Horse)
Kandia Crazy Horse x Decolonize This Place NYC
Kandia Crazy Horse (left) & Amy from Decolonize This Place @ the opening launch in TriBeCa – Amongst the many great allies I have met up with during my engagement with the Dakota Access Pipeline resistance, I include Amy (above), Brotha Amir Husain & the rest of the gang from the new Manhattan artists & revolutionary action space, Decolonize This Place. They will be hosting ongoing actions and events at their space including my own Sacred Water Medicine Show on Saturday, October 8th, 2016 @ 7pm. Check them out on Facebook to see their scheduling. We really connected at the #NoDAPL rally in Washington Square Park in early September, and will continue to be united in the pipeline resistance amongst other pressing causes affecting Indian Country, Palestine, the Boogiedown Bronx, and beyond
kandiacrazyhorse.com 