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Dance to Your Shadow:  Chasing a Song Across the World

The first in a series of travel narratives using music as a passport to explore world cultures.

Samples from the book:

From Scotland:

    Scottish waulking song Heman Dubh with Christine Primrose and Pam Swan

    Read about waulking songs and the meaning of these lyrics in the excerpt of Chapter 5.

    Follow these links to maps, find out about Gaelic language, and meet Christine.

From Arctic Canada:

    Inuit throat-singing with Madeleine Allakariallak and Pam Swan

    Read about the process of learning Inuit throat-singing in the excerpt of Chapter 11.

   Follow these links to maps, find out about Inuktitut language, and meet Madeleine.

From the Georgia Sea Islands

    Playsong Little Johnny Brown with The Georgia Sea Islands Singers and Pam Swan

    Read the history of this and other island slave songs in the excerpt of Chapter 18.

    Follow these links to maps, find out about Gullah language, and meet The Quimbys.

Submission package available on request including:

    Overview

    Market Analysis

    Promotion Plan

    Competitive Analysis

    Research Sources

    Author Information

    Story Summary

    Sample Chapter or Full Manuscript

Excerpts from Submission Package:

OVERVIEW

"The history of a people is in its songs."  George Jellinek

    Travel narrative junkies have heard it all before. The highest, driest, wettest, weirdest,

most embarrassing travel moments continue to fascinate readers--but as they browse the travel

 lit shelves these days, they’re searching for a story they’ve never heard. This book offers a

fresh approach–-traveling the world to study songs.

    Dance To Your Shadow: Chasing a Song Across the World is the first travel narrative using music

as a passport to explore the Scottish Hebrides, Arctic Canada and the Georgia Sea Islands.

The completed manuscript is 464 pages including back matter.

    The writing style combines humor, gee-whiz information about history and science, and

compelling storytelling to introduce us to three cultures through their songs.

In each case, the author explores local landscape, music and history with tradition bearers from

that culture. They teach her the meaning and importance of traditional songs, then record the

songs with her for a documentary CD called Dance To Your Shadow.

STORY SUMMARY

    Pam Swan is recording an album of traditional music with singers around the world. She’s

intrigued by the lyrics to an ancient Gaelic song called Dance to Your Shadow, but can’t find

out anything about it’s history. Pam travels to the Scottish Hebrides, digging through archives

and interviewing traditional singers, in an effort to uncover the meaning behind the words.

Along the way she encounters kilted tango dancers, evil sheep, bizarre uses for urine, and

the Giant Suitcase of Death.

    Ultimately what she discovers there is more than the meaning of the lyrics-–a new

perspective on tradition becomes clear as she chases the song through Scotland, England,

Nova Scotia, and back to the U.S.   In the Appalachian mountains with Peggy Seeger, she

discovers at last how the lyrics have evolved from an ancient Gaelic dance song into a modern

anthem of courage.

    As the project moves forward, Pam’s research on the album takes her to Arctic Canada,

where she comes face-to-face with the music and traditions of a hunting culture. Gradually

she adapts to 24-hour sunlight, the complex and subtle language of Inuktitut, and the taste

of raw whale. Falling in love with Arctic landscapes, sounds and people, Pam explores her

place as an outsider to other cultures, her place as a singer of traditional songs, and her place

as a mammal in the food chain.

    She now gets an opportunity rarely extended to outsiders–-the chance to study the

ancient art of Inuit throat-singing while living with a family on Baffin Island. When a walrus

hunt cancels their recording session, Pam and a local singer are invited to use the studio of

the Canadian Broadcasting Company to make a recording of this unusual mouth music called

katajjaq.

    After the lessons learned in northern cultures, Pam turns her attention to the last part

of her journey--the American South. Reuniting with African American singers and songs

from her youth, Pam travels to the remote Georgia Sea Island called Sapelo. There she

finds herself navigating carefully through alligator swamps, snake-filled marshes and the

social quicksand of race relations in the Deep South.

    Overcoming cultural barriers, secrets, suspicions and a day wandering lost in a swamp,

she comes home with more than the music–-she gains a deep appreciation of the places,

histories and people that are the heart of these cultures, and the soul of their traditional

songs.

    Wonderful recordings are made with tradition bearers in all three cultures--African

American slave songs with the Georgia Sea Island Singers, Inuit throat-singing with

Madeleine Allakariallak, and Scottish puirt-a-beul with Christine Primrose.

Get Involved

        Take a Workshop

        Book an Author Presentation

        Become a Consulting Reader

The Places and their Music

    The Scottish Hebrides (gallery, maps, links, sound samples, writing samples)

              Puirt-a-beul

             Waulking Songs

    Baffin Island, Nunavut

            Inuit Throat-singing

            Ay-ya-yas

    Georgia Sea Islands

            Slave Songs

            Play Songs