Trying to catch Buffy on paper is a little like trying to imagine a hummingbird if you have never seen one. This complex young Indian girl is full of the arrogance of the very shy (a very Indian trait), gentle with a wealth of compassion for the world and its people. Lately, Buffy has been finding herself with more truth than she carried with her when I first met her.
Buffy is very private, and resists any relationship which would capture or curtail her in any way. She often has voice trouble, which knocks her out of work, sometimes for weeks at a time, and she cannot and will not bear cold weather. Her schedule is arranged so that she works in the sun most of the year. This powerful, fragile, pretty, and magnificent folk queen has more going for her, and more going without her, than anyone else in the art.
She has said, "If you want someone to hear you, you must talk softly so they'll want to hear more." A soft Buffy would be a grand success internationally. The Cree Indian girl has banked passion, not readily seen on first meeting her. "I love to sing, love the way it feel, the sensual feeling of song in my throat." There speaks a woman, and an artist. She is a folk poet with the ability to instill truth into simplicity. She says, "It's so strange the difference between art and folk art, so much of folk art is spontaneity," and she has been able to retain this spontaneity under an avalanche of singing engagements, often under the terrible tension that club work breeds.
Buffy is very concerned with her audience ("I don't want any fools in my following"). She is, I can say with truth, a very fine authority on the American Indian. This carrying of the Indian's message is a beautiful part of Buffy, and those who do not appreciate her would do well to remember she has never forgotten her people. It is very difficult to grow up ashamed and shy among your schoolmates because you're strange and different and alien, then to find pride and strength from the very disaster of your people and carry it with you as first concern in an overcrowded heart.
I think Buffy has written very well for humanity, but loved it little. It may not be enough just to care for your own people. Sitting Bull's motto read, "There is more." She dislikes with a passion "people of any race who walk around with their white collars down to the ground and over their heads," and most of our world is made up of such, but there are others. It is an odd thing to think, but when Buffy achieves the success she has aimed for, then she will dance the rainbow. And God of the white men and the Gods of my people go with her.
"People shouldn't put other people into corners," says Buffy, and I hope I haven't. "I intend to sing forever, when I'm old and have no figure and no long hair and an ancient face, then I will still be singing," she has said. I hope she does.
This article comes from Sing Out! v.15#1, ©1965 Sing Out!. Used by permission. All rights reserved.