Denali, AK

September 3, 2017
Population: 185
Venue: Tonglen Lake Lodge

Fairbanks was as far north as we were going.

On this day we drove back down the way we came, through Healy, and right to the entrance of Denali National Park. As I’ve mentioned, my tour route only extended as far as the highway system goes in Alaska. There are hundreds of miles of land that sprawl north and west of Fairbanks, only accessible by bush flights or snowmobile. The land population in northern Alaska is less than one per square mile, but the land that is occupied by humans was originally done so by indigenous people. One audience member from this night's concert talked to me afterward about setting up flights for me to visit villages with my piano. I would *die* for this opportunity!

Another audience member was a documentary filmmaker and English professor from Fairbanks, Leonard Kamerling. He had spent time living with Yupik Eskimo people, documenting their dance tradition. After the tour, I read a book Len recommended, Ordinary Wolves by Seth Kantner. Spending time with this book, Len’s film “The Drums of Winter,” and visiting the excellent Anchorage Museum at the end of tour all helped me think a little more deeply about the fraught relationship between indigenous cultures and white settlers. 

So here we were, back at Denali National Park. We moved the piano into the venue in the late morning (the most difficult one yet, involving a set of stairs), and opted for a hike in the park before the concert. You may remember that until 2015, the park was known as Mt. McKinley National Park. Obama made the executive decision to change the name back to Denali, meaning “the tall one” in the Koyukon language indigenous to the area. Did you know that President McKinley literally had nothing to do with Alaska? Full story of the name controversy here. Also, I didn’t know this until I arrived in Alaska, but it’s important to note: the correct pronunciation of Denali is “de-nally,” not “den-awl-ee” (rhymes with valley, not folly). 

Our venue that day was Tonglen Lake Lodge, which sits a few miles from the park entrance and is not part of any town, just a census-designated place of population 185. As such, there’s not much of a local audience to gather. However, the owner of Tonglen Lake, Donna Gates, is an artist herself, and she designed the lodge with the goal of inspiring guests with art amongst nature. She hosts live performances throughout the summer and adorns the grounds with Alaskan art. She even hosts a cello workshop every summer! My visit was off-season and also coincided with the 100th anniversary of Denali National Park. Park rangers from around the country were in the area for the celebrations, but they had their own social events to attend, so my concert was sparsely attended. 

Regardless, I enjoyed getting to know the characters I mentioned above, even sitting around a firepit on beautiful log swings with a few audience members late into the night. People were so rapt with the music that they left their wine and pizza untouched during the dramatic Beethoven sonata. One audience member gave me a big hug immediately after the concert in tears, telling me that the music made her think of her deceased mother. The longer I went on this tour, the more I was starting to feel like a therapist of sorts…