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The ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Department of Music's Circumpolar Music Series continues this semester with a presentation by guest scholar, Maria Shaa Tláa Williams. The presentation, "" will take place on Thursday, Jan. 26 at 1 p.m. in the Davis Concert Hall. Williams will showcase characteristics and developments of ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñn Native musics in the past, present, and future. This event is free, open to the public, and is the final event of the 2022-2023 Circumpolar Music Series!

Maria Williams was born in Tikahtnu – or Anchorage, ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ and is an enrolled member of the Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indians of ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ. She is of the Raven Moiety, and of the Deishetaan clan. She received her M.A. and Ph.D. in Music, specializing in Ethnomusicology from UCLA. The title of her M.A. Thesis is: Clan Identification and Social Structure in Tlingit Music (1989) and the title of her dissertation is ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Native Music: The Spirit of Survival (1996). She was a Ford Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow in 1998 and researched surviving ceremonial music/dance in ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ. She taught at the Institute for American Indian arts from 1993-1995, and at the University of New Mexico from 1999-2011 with a joint appointment in the department of Native American Studies and Music. She moved back to ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ in 2011 and has been teaching at the University of ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Anchorage since 2011 in the departments of ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Native Studies and Music, where she is a full professor.

The Circumpolar Music Series is a new initiative led by the ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Department of Music beginning in 2022. CMS will annually showcase artists, scholars, and musicians who identify with the circumpolar region of the world. Through performances, lectures, and hands-on activities, distinct features of northern art and music will be shared and explored. The ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Department of Music is grateful to its generous benefactor, Catherine Madsen for her support of the Circumpolar Music Series.