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Barry Lee and Spirit Wing at the Philly Folk Fest
by
Mike DelVecchia
 Barry Lee, Barbara Christy and Chris Hawley of Spirit Wing, could be said to have the deeper roots in the Philadelphia area than any of the acts who appeared at the Philadelphia Folk Festival. Mr. Lee who lives in Perkasie, is part Lenape and Munsee, Native American. Spirit Wing specializes in Native American Music consisting of original songs, traditional music, and some cover tunes that relate well to the Native American experience. Spirit Wing helped host the Festival's Campfire Sing Along and performs at numerous Pow Wows and Native American Gatherings in Pennsylvania along with Coffee Houses and other venues. Spirit Wing was also featured at the PhillyFolk 9/11 Benefit Concert. Raised in East Rock Hill, PA, and entertaining for over thirty years playing blue grass, blues and country he said, "I always felt somehow different from other people and didn't understand why until I began to embrace the Lenape culture more closely." It was common until recently for people in Philadelphia to conceal their Native American backgrounds in order to become employed. However, Mr. Lee said, "I felt the culture was very strong in me." When he went hunting as a child with his father in Bucks County, his father told him that if he missed after he took a shot at a dear, not to shoot again, because the animal had earned the right to live that day. "This story fits in well with the Native American teachings," Mr. Lee said.
Mr. Lee, who is also Polish and Italian, began attending pow wows studying the Native American experience, networking with the Oneida Nation Iroquois Confederacy in New York, allying with recording artist Joanne Shenandoah. He was adopted into the Lenape nation. "I never wrote music until I entered this genre. It flowed from me as soon as I became aware of who I was." He joined forces with Barbara Christy who is Shawnee, Cheyanne and Cherokee and began composing. As the band's legend goes, in 2000 a Lenape Clan Mother asked the pair to convert a poem she had written about her family's experience attending the Carlisle Indian School in the early 1900's, into a musical composition. Mr. Lee and Ms. Christy, thereupon, formed Spirit Wing, taking on bass player Chris Lee during the recording of their CD, "Ancient Spirit Voices." Ms. Christy and Mr. Lee volunteered at the festival for four years before their first performance, this year. The group plays almost any type of venue. At a Stetson Junior High School performance in West Chester, the students became instant fans. The sad historical, "Trail of Tears," explains, Mr. Lee, "made two Cherokee grandmothers rise from their seats and form a dance circle, following the mournful motions of their ancestors who were driven off of their land," during a recent show at the Pierpont Military Base. In September, Spirit Wing played the Ridley Creek State Park pow wow.
Mr. Lee, a Marine Corp veteran, whose birth surname is Janiszewski, works a day job in a chemical plant manufacturing nylon twill whose base is the castor bean. He said he was
advised by Lenape elders to use his musical gifts to influence fans to save the land and its people. "The elders said that spiritual ancestors still walk this ground. They'll look for receptive hearts and they'll influence these hearts. It is proper that you follow in the elders' paths," Mr. Lee remembered.
Pennsylvania, he said, unlike New York and other states, "still does not embrace its Native American culture as closely as it could." Listening to the cedar flutes of his music, which Mr. Lee said, "are meant to help the listener to stop and listen to what is happening in nature and appreciate the world for its beauty," one cannot imagine that with Mr. Lee's continued help, Native American culture will remain alien to Pennsylvania for very long.
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