John Two-Hawks is a Platinum Award winning Oglala Lakota Native American musician who has been performing professionally in live concerts since the early 1990s. He sings and plays many instruments, but is best known as a pioneer and virtuoso player of the Native American flute. To date, he has produced sixteen CD recordings and a DVD, and has also written a number of books filled with Native American wisdom to accompany some of his CDs. He often guest lectures for schools and universities on Native American history and culture, and he has shared time with Presidents, Senators and Movie Stars as a featured speaker.
He is featured as the Native American vocalist and cedar flute player for the song "Creek Mary's Blood" on the Nightwish album Once. He also appeared on Nightwish's End of an Era CD/DVD, a recording of their live performance in Helsinki, Finland on October 21, 2005. There he performed "Stone People" from his album Honor as a prelude for "Creek Mary's Blood", which he then performed with the band before a sold-out audience of 12,000. It is to be noted that Tuomas Holopainen, keyboardist and composer for Nightwish, never plays the song without Two-Hawks.
Other collaborations include concerts and recordings with Celtic singer and flutist Seamus Byrne, classical guitarist Sir Charles Hammer, and pianist Bastiaan Pot. He composed and performed the music and sound effects for the accompanying audio CD for a children's book by Sicangu Lakota writer Joseph M. Marshall III and Yankton Sioux illustrator Joseph Chamberlain. Two-Hawks was also the co-producer of the book. John Two-Hawks was the featured musician in the musical score for the Emmy Award winning HBO production of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee which originally aired in May 2007. The musical score by George S. Clinton which featured Two-Hawks' music, earned one of 17 Emmy nominations, and was released as a soundtrack CD in 2007. Primarily, however, Two-Hawks is a solo artist. While his compositions often include many different instruments, he plays all of them himself.
John Two-Hawks presently lives in the Ozark Mountains of Arkansas.
Discography
- Red and Blue Days (?)
- Voices (June 2000)
- Good Medicine (March 2001) - has an accompanying book
- Traditions (September 2001) - with Manach (Seamus Byrne)
- Heal (July 2002)
- Peace on Earth (November 2003) - Christmas music
- Honor (March 2004)
- Wild Eagles DVD (2004) - part of the Cedar Lake Nature DVD series
- Signature Series 2-CD Set (April 2005)
- How Not To Catch Fish and Other Adventures of Iktomi (June 2005) - a children's book by Joseph M. Marshall III that comes with a bonus audio CD.
- Beauty Music (2006) - with Seamus Byrne and Sir Charles Hammer
- Come to the Fire (April 2006) - has an accompanying book
- Touch the Wind (2006) - with Bastiaan Pot
- Cedar Dreams (July 2007)
- Elk Dreamer (March 2008)
- of dirt and dreams (September 2008) - The Badlanders with Van Adams
Bibliography
- Good Medicine (March 2001)
- How Not To Catch Fish and Other Adventures of Iktomi (June 2005) - a children's book by Joseph M. Marshall III that comes with a bonus audio CD.
- Come to the Fire (April 2006)
- To Make a V
oice (2008) - Includes bonus audio CD of "Black Cherry Moon" (Single)
