Nakai, R. Carlos (16th April 1946-Present)

He is a Native American flautist, arranger and composer born Raymond Carlos Nakai in Flagstaff, Arizona to a family who are of Navajo and Ute descent where his father, also Raymond, was the Chairman of the Navajo for seven years from 1963 to 1970. His parents hosted a Navajo language show, which he’d make audition tapes for and after entering high school at Arizona’s Colorado River Indian Reservation he joined the band. He wanted to play the flute but he was given the cornet to play instead. In 1966 he studied at Northern Arizona University and continued to play in the brass section when he performed in the marching band.

Whole in his second year at the University he was called on to do his military service and entered the United States Navy. While in the Navy he served in the South Pacific and Hawaii and studied communications and electronics. He also received music training during those years but because he wasn’t from Hawaii he was turned down for the Royal Hawaiian Band. In 1971 he returned home to the reservation for a period before auditioning and passing for a place in the Armed Forces School of Music. However, he could not continue to play brass with the band after he had a car accident in 1971 which had damaged his mouth.

In 1972 he taught himself to play the traditional cedar flute after he had been given one after his accident. It was difficult at first to find written music or any recordings of this type of flute so he took it upon himself to adapt traditional songs and learn vocal music so he could play his own arrangements.

He went back to Northern Arizona University in in 1979 where he earned his Bachelor’s degree. He then took further studies at the University of Arizona where he earned his Master of Music degree in American Indian studies.

Continuing with his music career he started to record his music on cassette and sell them to customers on the reservation, but after he was heard giving a concert at the Heard Museum in Phoenix, Arizona, he was given a job at the museum where he worked for three years.

While performing at the concert in the museum he had sold a cassette to a Canyon Records representative and before long he signed a contract with the record label. He would go on to record with the label for several decades and by 2016 had released over fifty albums, with more than 40 on Canyon Records. During these years he had collaborated with several artists which include Udi Bar-David from the Philadelphia Orchestra, the composer Philip Glass, the flautists Paul Horn and Nawang Khechog, the guitarists Keola Beamer and William Eaton and the Japanese ensemble Wind Travelin’ Band. He has also performed with ore than 30 chamber and symphony orchestras and formed his own R. Carlos Nakai Quartet.

Some of his albums include Changes, Jackalope, Earth Spirit, Desert Dance, Canyon Trilogy, Spirit Horses, Dances With Rabbits, How the West Was Lost, Feather, Stone & Light, Mystic Dreamer, Inside Monument Valley, Ancient Future, Fourth World, Sanctuary, Our Belove Land, Talisman, Dancing Into Silence and Nocturne among many others.

His recordings have been very highly acclaimed and had 11 Grammy Award nominations and held the No. 1 spot on the New Age music album chart. He was also a featured artist on the 1999 film Songkeepers which is about five Native American flautists.

The American Folklife Center in the Library of Congress’s have preserved 30 recordings of his and he has been awarded an honorary doctorate by Northeran Arizona University in 1994. He was inducted into the Arizona Music and Entertainment Hall of Fame in 2005.

In the field of musical education he was a graphic art high school teacher until 1983.

Sources:

Nakai, R. Carlos (16th April 1946-Present)

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