Portrait of a jingle dress dancer

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Not all jingle cones are created equal.

Like other musical instruments, they come in different sizes, qualities, tone and pitch.

Combining a selection of tinkling cones with a traditional or contemporary dance style, each jingle dress dancer creates a signature sound of her own.

Jingle dress dancer Alanna Tootoosis orchestrates her own unique sound with a personal favorite, silver jingles cut and folded from finely tuned Copenhagen snuff can lids.

Born into a powwow family from Poundmaker First Nation, Alanna has been dancing since she could first walk, a seasoned traveller on the powwow trail.

"My mother Irene Tootoosis danced women's fancy shawl. My dad Gordon Tootoosis danced men's fancy before they both switched to traditional style. My sisters and brother also danced.

"That's how I met my husband Sidrick Baker in 1984, a singer and dancer from the Mandaree Singers," she said.

Alanna had watched jingle dress as a child, but jingle dancers were rare birds in the newly emerging North American powwow culture during the sixties and seventies.

Jingle dress had not yet become a separate category in dance competition. It was not until the mid-eighties that the jingle dress started coming out again.

The original jingle dance traditions from the late 1800s had been kept alive by the Ojibway in northern Minnesota and by the Anishnabe of Ontario.

"People said it had died out but it didn't," said Alanna.

After the birth of her first son in 1986, Alanna decided to exchange her fancy shawl for a jingle dress.

"In the mid-eighties, I became totally fascinated by it, the sound and style. We went to Minnesota and contacted a family of sisters who danced old traditional jingle and one of them, Clara Jackson, a really good dancer, introduced us to her sister Norma, a regalia maker, and so I was able to acquire my dress," said Alanna.

There are many variations in the old stories, passed down through oral tradition, on the origins of the jingle dance dress, also called a prayer, healing, singing or medicine dress.

Two common threads running through the legends are that the right to wear the prayer dress is acquired through a dream given to a dancer, and that spiritual healing and medicine is at the heart of the power of the dress.

"In Minnesota I was told an old story about a man who had a daughter who was very sick. A dream came to him, that he should make four jingle dance dresses and have four women dance for his daughter and pray. After they danced for four days, his daughter became well," said Alanna.

"The important thing is that it was passed on in a dream. Spiritual and cultural protocol is also important."

With close to two hundred years of jingle dress dance tradition under their belts, modern dancers have taken both traditional and contemporary turns in style and interpretation.

"At the powwow in the Leach Lake reservation in Minnesota, you can see a hundred and fifty ladies, very young and old and the sound of them dancing together is just incredible, very powerful.

"One lady in her seventies has pure white hair, and oh, she can dance, a really exceptional traditional dancer," said Alanna.

Traditional dance form has changed over the years. Today, many young jingle dancers have adopted shawl-dancing moves, spinning, kicking and lifting their knees and feet high off the ground.

"As an old time stylist, I keep my feet low to the ground, rarely lift my foot high off the ground. When I dance I feel proud, hold my head high, but feel relaxed. The energy of the crowds, the dance and the drum is amazing and lifts you so that you don't feel tired," said Alanna.

The dancer's fan is raised on the honor beats of the drum, and today, many girls and women wear plumes in their hairpieces.

At traditional jingle dance specials, some families will ask for 'no feathers' to be worn and 'no plumes.'

"Looking at the antique photographs from the 1900s, you do not see women wearing plumes and feathers, or carrying ans," said Alanna. "What you do see at old time traditional powwows in eastern Canada and the United States are women dancing side by side, facing inward in the arbor, like in a round dance, laughing and having a real fun time, with arms going up and down like round dancers," she said.

In western Canada, southern California and Arizona, jingle dance has become more contemporary.

"You see a lot more fancy steps, fancy materials, here and in southern California and Arizona, much flashier," she said. "Songs have really evolved and changed over the years. To me, a woman really has no say with what goes on with that drum, in terms of the beat. I remember in the sixties and seventies, songs being so much faster than they are today. Tapes from the sixties, recorded by my late father-in-law are so fast," she added.

The old traditional jingle dance dresses were made from prints or cotton broadcloth, highly valued trade goods, with the tightly rolled tin cones laid in geometric or scallop style.

"You don't see very many of the old Copenhagen dresses anymore, but some of the oldest traditions are returning. I have seen replicas of the very old style dresses worn in the last 10 years," said Alanna.

Feeling the weight and heaviness of modern jingle dress brings home the fact that jingle dancing is not only very spiritual, a healing dance, it is also technically and physically demanding to create and dance in.

"I chose Copenhagen snuff can lids for the beautiful sound. I have 800 Copenhagen lids given to me as gifts, which means a lot of work cutting, folding, rolling for the right shape," said Alanna.

"Some people say you have to have 365 for each day of the year, but I use as many as are needed by each dress. People wonder why the dress is so expensive, but all the material and bias tape, jingles and beadwork add up. Fancy material is nice but does not last long with the wear and tear, washing the dress and the weight of the jingles. For a new dress, we reset and recyle lids, turn them inside out and refold," she said.

Time is a big factor as to whether a dancer sews her own outfits or hires the job out.

Whitney Charging Eagle created the Woodland floral beading black velvet vest that Alanna wears over her dress.

Charlene Kozak, a regalia maker from Oklahoma, who travels all over searching for the ultimate piece of material, created a traditional beaded cape for Alanna, to match those in the old pictures.

Modern jingle dress dancers have special problems clearing customs on international flights.

"It is difficult to get though customs with a suitcase full of jingle dresses, first because of the weight, and secondly because of the metal cones, which can send the metal detectors right off the charts," said Alanna.

Although she admits that there is a competitive spirit among dancers, there is also a deep camaraderie.

"We are dancing for the people, for loved ones passed on, and for those that don't have the ability to dance for themselves," said Alanna.

It was the sweet sound of her jingles that helped set Alanna's wedding bells in motion.

"Sidrick and I wanted to get married but didn't know how or when we could afford to. We went to the Red Earth powwow in Oklahoma; I took second, won $2,000. My fiance also won in his category and we suddenly had enough to have our wedding."