A Song Often Played on the Radio

Considered a staple of Florida tourism, alligator wrestling has been performed by members of the Seminole Tribe for over a century. As the practice has changed over the years, Halpate profiles the hazards and history of the spectacle through the words of the tribe's alligator wrestlers themselves and what it has meant to their people's survival.

A musical composition where the instruments played are firearms. Here, tools of violence are transformed into mechanisms for musical resistance.

In this series of three videos, American Indian women sing the history of a landscape, including its present, past, and future, where a conflict, displacement or massacre of their tribe took place. The songs reference the Navajo Long Walk, the Trail of Tears and resulting drownings in the Arkansas and Mississippi Rivers, and the removal of the Seminole people from their homelands. Chacon describes: “These songs of resistance, with only a snare drum as accompaniment, become a sonic testimony, an acknowledgement of shared survival, and a healing call in their mother tongues.”

"Abduction Song" follows an oral account in Diné language, relayed by Chacon’s grandfather, of family lineage resulting from a kidnapping of his great-grandmother from the Navajo homelands. While filming in restricted areas of the Albuquerque International Airport, the camera moves as though it is surveilling the site, creating a disjuncture in time, presenting a generations-old story of abduction while capturing the transit of people in present-day Albuquerque.

This Albuquerque music documentary was filmed during the Summer and Fall of 2022 and captures a sample of bands, venues, characters, and history that make up the DIY scene. Featuring Los Mocos, Cracks in the Sidewalk, Nomestomper, Crushed!?, Sabertooth Cavity, Raven Chacon, Manny Rettinger, Gordy Andersen, and many more.