“Johnson has been exploring various aspects of the flute from the quantum physics of sound, to healing meditative applications of playing, to courtship. When he’s not riding the waves of his flute’s sound he’s riding the ocean’s waves— he’s been an avid surfer for over 18 years. Johnson has been exploring various aspects of the flute from the quantum physics of sound, to healing meditative applications of playing, to courtship. When he’s not riding the waves of his flute’s sound he’s riding the ocean’s waves— he’s been an avid surfer for over 18 years.”
Walter J. Johnson has a down-to-earth but incredibly interesting life. He spends his time surfing, researching, lecturing, storytelling, writing, playing the flute and holding ceremonial space.
Johnson’s Indian name is Ogi-Mow-Gaboo, he is of Potawatomi/Ho-Chunk mixed-European descent. He carries a B.A. in American Studies, minored in American Indian Studies, and has guest lectured at Berkeley City College.
Over the past 27 years he has researched indigenous life— social, cultural, inter-tribal relations, and the physical land and resources and how they relate to indigenous flute making and playing.
He has been playing the flute for over 26 years in the San Francisco Bay Area and has performed for the American Indian Child Resource Center Oakland, the Berkeley Indigenous Peoples Day Pow-Wow, the Inter-Tribal Friendship house of Oakland and San Francisco. Johnson has played over an estimated 2,000 events since the early ‘90s, including funerals, weddings, guest lectures and library performances.
Johnson has been exploring various aspects of the flute from the quantum physics of sound, to healing meditative applications of playing, to courtship. When he’s not riding the waves of his flute’s sound he’s riding the ocean’s waves— he’s been an avid surfer for over 18 years.
With these two loves— surfing and flute playing— he has a great idea of the way waveforms move, the way matter moves.
He says that the scales on the flute can produce a multitude of wave frequencies, either a single note or a particular scale. He points out that humans are made of up to 60% water and that water is directly affected by sound.
His ultimate goal is to understand the cause and effect of these frequencies on the human. He intends to further research the science of the flute and how frequency plays an important role in the physics of human nature.
To Johnson, the flute is “mystical, almost magical, it brought me a really deep connection to the earth,” he said.
He recalled the first time playing the flute when he was young. “It was a moment when you’re like, ‘Oh, this is who I am.’ It was a magical experience.”
Johnson believes the indigenous flute deserves a place in sound therapy and that it should be recognized by the academic and scholastic communities as an instrument of the First Nations people.
Generations of his family have played the flute and have done so with great respect for the art and ritual.
“I don’t drink alcohol. I cleanse myself four days before [playing] warmups [with the flute] and cleansing by fasting,” says Johnson.
The ceremonial aspects of playing flute are very important to him, he won’t pick it up and just play.
“That way, when I pick up the instrument, my body is ready to play it,” adds Johnson.
Recently he’s been nominated for the 2020 Lost Chord Award and has a fourth upcoming book titled The Other Side of Light, about the affects and effects of the indigenous North American flute, a cultural journey.
Carly J.J. Turner, aka Mede Potawatamig Ikwe, is O’Jibway from The Minnesota Chippewa Tribe White Earth Indian Reservation and the Wisconsin Bad River LaPointe Band of the Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa Indians. Her Clan is Mukwa-Bear. She holds the honor of being a Pipe-Carrier and a Hollow Bone.
Carly was trained to be a medicine woman by the late high-level shamanic healer/indian doctor Fawn Journeyhawk from the Mandan (Crow) and Shawnee tribes. She is also taught her traditional ways from her father Deadgrass.
When Carly isn’t skipping through a pink-glittered desert speaking with her animal friends, she’s likely to be away fasting and praying or simply enjoying a cup of puerh tea and creating art.
She has an Associates Degree in Art and a Journalism and New Media CCL.
Carly has been creating many different mediums of physical art and digital art for over a decade and dreams of creating bigger projects as an expression of her medicine work.
She hopes to spread her art and healing to many.