On the Filmmakers
Filmmaker: Margaret Hixon
Margaret Hixon was born in Georgia, grew up in the Midwest; she graduated in English, University of Wisconsin, and later took a graduate degree at Reed College. In Portland, Oregon, she taught college English and studied film and film production at the American Film Institute in Beverly Hills, in London, and at the Anthropology Film Center in Santa Fe. Filming the community of Russian Old Believers in Marion County at last became possible with a focus on folk expressions of a wedding ceremony. The documentary Old Believers, was a finalist at the American Film Festival in 1982 and received a Golden Eagle from the State Department. It was shown widely in Russia during an anthropologist friend's lecture tour. Later a parallel film followed of a wedding in a traditional Hispanic community in New Mexico, Celebratión del Matrimonio in 1986. The next year she moved to New Zealand and from there visited the Tongan Islands, which led to research for a biography of Salote Tupou III, published as Salote, Queen of Paradise (Dunedin, New Zealand: University of Otago Press, 2000). An earlier short film, Muttonbird, is held at the New Zealand Film Archive.
Cinematography: Jack Parsons
Although born in New York City, Jack Parsons has been, like his grandmother, the anthropologist Elsie Clews Parsons, deeply immersed in the culture of the Southwest. He took undergraduate and graduate degrees at the University of Colorado and has spent years photographing and producing books about Southwestern landscapes, pueblo architecture, lowrider cars, and other regional traditions. He has cinematographic credits for Celebración del Matrimonio and other films. With NEA support he carried out a three-year survey of traditional santeros and a two-year Entriega Project, recording traditional Hispanic musicians. In 2006 New Mexico awarded him the Governor's Award for Excellence and Achievement in the Arts. His website shows a sampling of his striking photographs and gives further information about his career: http://www.jackparsonsdigital.com/MainPages/Bio.html
Consultant: Enrique R. Lamadrid
Professor Enrique R. Lamadrid is Director of Chicano-Hispano-Mexicano Studies at the University of New Mexico and a leading authority on the folklore and music of the southwestern states. He has published five books, including Hermanitos Comanchitos (University of New Mexico Press, 2003), awarded the Chicago Folklore Prize. He has also written many book chapters and articles and has participated in the production of a dozen sound recordings and fourteen documentary films. He was an advisor and translator for Celebración del Matrimonio and is the author of an important article relating to the film, “Las Entriegas: Ceremonial Music and Cultural Resistance on the Upper Rio Grande” discussed on this website. For a detailed listing of his professional research and activities see his website: http://www.unm.edu/~spanport/faculty/lamadrid/lamadridcv.pdf
Sound: Jack Loeffler
Jack Loeffler was born in West Virginia, grew up in Ohio and Connecticut, studied music, and played the trumpet professionally with jazz ensembles across the United States. But in 1962 he settled in New Mexico. While he has done much field work elsewhere, he has been especially deeply engaged in documenting the aural history of New Mexico and defending its natural environment and indigenous cultures. He has made hundreds of impeccable field recordings among the Navajo, Hopi, Ute, Tewa, Keresan, Zuni, Chiricahua Apache, Tohono O’odham, Nez Perce, Yaqui, Seri, Huichol, Tarahumara, Mayan, and California Indians; and Hispano, Basque, and Anglo-ranch cultures. His traditional music archive contains over 3,500 songs that he recorded to broadcast standards. He has shared his materials in radio broadcasts, LP recordings, cassettes, and CD albums, and has participated in creating over 50 soundtracks for documentary films, videos, and museum exhibitions. In 2008 he received the New Mexico Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts.
