While at the Grand Canyon on the south rim, I was about a mile away from the Hopi house when I heard the deep rhythmic sound of the powwow drum. I was amazed that the sound could carry that far. The source of the sound was the daily show of drumming, dancing and chanting at the Indian Museum. The next day I was there to see the most spiritual and dignified ceremony imaginable. An old Navaho was accompanied and steadied by his grandson to the drum circle where his chant to the spirits was haunting and beautiful.

After the performance people were gathered around the aged chanter. I asked the grandson if he or his grandfather could help me create a drumming instrument for my friend, Mitchell. He translated to the old man my quest for my friend back east named Mitchell. The old man's translation to me was that he had heard of this Mitchell in the East, both the big mountain and the tall man and he would show me the Ta-Nish. He took me aside and with a stick drew in the sand with great detail something beyond my imagination. He was saying all the time he was drawing and pointing Ta-Nish, Ta-Nish. When he had finished showing me and patiently waiting for my questions he with one motion of his hand erased the image from the sand. My mind was racing with the possibilities of creating what I had just seen. I thanked him and wished that I could spend the day with this gentle man with the aged and wrinkled face, but that was not to be, for he had to return to his admiring audience. I asked his grandson the meaning of the word Ta-Nish and he said that it was an old word that he did not know. Maybe the word was the name of the instrument or the sound that it makes (TA-NISH).

Perhaps the mystery in the name can be resolved by the big mountain and the tall man named Mitchell.