John Allen Hill / John Two Hawks / John Twohawks

[Epiphany]

JTH's father is John H Hill. John H Hill's parents names are noted in his obit http://miserybay.usanethosting.com/sjindy/archives/obits/000729.shtml

John H Hill http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=19980313

His father Allen B Hill http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=19980312
His mother Florine Bond http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=15657808

John H. Hill's parents (JTH's grandparents) are both white, born in Michigan, in the 1940 census: https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/K42P-LJC

(Interesting side note: Allen B. Hill's (JTH's paternal grandfather) occupation listed on full 1940 census is musician)

[AnneLa]

I am from the town he used to have a 'Native American' shop in, he used to claim Lakota and Potawatomi heritage but was always vague on quantum percentage. It became quite fishy a few months in... I first knew for sure it was about a living when I noticed he had dropped the Potowatomi claim on his website. I suspect he was a bit delusional, not intentionally misleading originally... As he was shown it could not have been true he should have admitted it and moved on instead of continuing to swindle.

He used to claim to be an ordained Christian minister also, has anyone found more on this?

[Superdog]

He used to claim to be an ordained Christian minister also, has anyone found more on this?

Considering he was the front man for two Christian rock bands, I wouldn't say it's impossible.  But no, I haven't seen any info to confirm that.

Superdog

[Superdog]

Seems John Allen Hill has said "screw it" to the Indian Arts and Crafts Act.  This seems like a pretty clear violation:

http://www.johntwohawks.com/about.html

"John Two-Hawks has earned Grammy® and Emmy nominations, Platinum Album awards, had his signature brand of music featured in Fox Searchlight movies, HBO films and programs by The History Channel.  He is a veteran Native American Flute virtuoso and music visionary who has always set new trends and broken new ground in music genres.  From collaborating on platinum selling music fusion projects which melded Native American flute and vocals with symphonic heavy metal, to contributing his music on Emmy award winning film scores which teamed native flute, voice and percussion with symphony orchestras and choirs, John has always enjoyed exploring the limits of what is possible in music composition and performance.  He has toured the world and performed for audiences as large as 12,000.  A remarkably gifted musician, composer and vocalist, Two-Hawks' signature brand of Native American, World, and New Age Fusion music is known and loved by millions around the world.  John, whose Lakota name is Siyotanka (Big/Great Flute), belongs to the Oglala Lakota community, and it is from this cultural lineage that the soul of all his music is born."

IACA requires truth in advertising.  John used to do a good job of using language that dances around any claims that he's actually Native, however this claim of belonging to the Oglala Lakota community seems to be another in his long list of untruths.  Business must've took a dip after the Nightwish debacle became public knowledge. 

Superdog

[Schecter]

I have the answers to a lot on this subject If anyone is still wondering.

[Sparks]

I have the answers to a lot on this subject If anyone is still wondering.

Yes, I am still wondering, because this guy still has followers and admirers in Scandinavia.

[Sparks]

For Wikipedia, this kind of bio is unusual and quite amazing in its laconic shortness:

Background and early career
For the authorized biography, click here: http://www.johntwohawks.com/biography.htm

The "authorized biography" is very vague. No Lakota or other NDN claims, only once is "Native heritage" mentioned, no further details.

The Wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Two-Hawks does not exist anymore.

The biography page at http://www.johntwohawks.com/biography.htm does not exist anymore.

The latter has probably been replaced by these two pages, from which I quote the following:

John, whose Lakota name is Siyotanka (Big/Great Flute), is of mixed ancestry but he has never been mixed up about his personal ethnic identity.  He has always been honored to belong to the Oglala Lakota community, to have deep connections with the good people who know him there, and it is from this cultural lineage that the soul of all his music is born.

John Two-Hawks - Personal Background

John Two-Hawks, Oglala Lakota Native American Flute Player, Musician, Actor, Speaker and Activist

The Journey of John Two-Hawks from humble beginnings to world renown
Early Life.... Names and Identity....
John Two-Hawks is the first-born child of a young, soft spoken father and a spirited teenage mother.  Both John’s mother and father were of mixed heritage, thus imparting Lakota, Anishinabe, Irish and French bloodlines, but it is John's Oglala Lakota blood and culture that has always been his identity.  Like so many American Indian people of mixed ancestry, John is not enrolled, nor did he grow up on the rez, but he is involved and connected to the Oglala Lakota community on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.  John's legal surname, Two-Hawks, goes back several generations to a maternal ancestor, thus it is not the name he was born with, but it is a family name he is honored to carry on.  John's traditional Lakota name is Siyotanka (she-oh-tahn-kah).  It means 'Big/Great Flute', and was given to him by a beloved and respected Oglala Lakota Elder.  This is the name that means the most, and is his true identity as an Oglala Lakota man.  And yet, his journey back to that identity is rife with the familial legacy of confusing, winding and convoluted paths of forced assimilation, hidden heritage, mixed marriages, family secrets and broken homes which are too often the reality of Native people with mixed ancestry.  Paper does not always tell the whole story.  John has spent his entire life learning, and he is humbled and honored to have been welcomed back and shown so much by such wise and knowledgeable Lakota Elders, relatives and friends.  Throughout his youth and up to the present, Two-Hawks quietly listened and learned old songs and traditions, and he holds those lessons closest to his heart.  Invited in 2013 to participate in the Chief Big Foot Memorial Ride, John is humbled to have made that 135 mile journey of spiritual sacrifice on a horse with his Lakota relatives and friends.  Being a Big Foot rider is one of the great honors of his life.  Two-Hawks also stood with his people again at Standing Rock, another great honor.  It was in his mid-twenties that his activism began, as he spoke on Native contemporary and historical culture at universities and schools, working to educate students, breaking stereotypes and correcting misinformation about First Nations people.  John spoke publicly about the 'Indian mascot' issue, and sat on community discussion panels with other prominent Native leaders at public schools to address it.  The National Coalition on Racism in Sports and Media even wrote a letter in the 1990s commending him for his work on that issue.  Two-Hawks continues that work to this day.  In the end, John is just who he is - the sum of all his parts and experiences... nothing more, nothing less.

Two-Hawks' parents were both lovers of music, and encouraged him very early in his life to explore his musical gifts.  He began playing the guitar and singing at age 5.  Both of John’s grandfathers were remarkable musicians who played literally dozens of different kinds of instruments, so he comes by his musical talents naturally.

Is this a different self-description than earlier?

[educatedindian]

Hill is doing a lot less ceremony selling than before. But he is still selling a "medicine retreat" on his homepage.

Found this page.

----------
http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Once_(Nightwish_album);
Controversy
On 5 January 2013, a member of the Nightwish forum discovered the alleged Lakota language spoken in the song "Creek Mary's Blood" is not actually Lakota, only spoken gibberish, and stated that John Two-Hawks is a fraud.[37] There are other claims that John Two-Hawks broke the Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990 truth in advertising law by "advertising his music as Native American, and himself as a Native American artisan." John Two-Hawks denied these claims and said that the poem spoken in Creek Mary's Blood has a lot of errors, even though he had a "fluent friend" check to see if the poem has no errors. John Two-Hawks also said that he is Native American though he is not in any Native American tribe.[38] The Nightwish forum member went on to post a correct translation of the spoken poem in "Creek Mary's Blood".[38]

-------
Also his IMDB admits he's not Native. These are usually closely monitored and controlled by the person or their management.

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1234690/bio?ref_=nm_ov_bio_sm
Birth Name   John Allen Hill
Height   6' 4" (1.93 m)
Mini Bio (1)
John Two-Hawks is a Grammy and Emmy nominated recording artist whose music has been featured in movies by Fox Searchlight, HBO, and The History Channel. He plays multiple instruments, but is best known for performing and recording Native American-style Flute Music (though he is not Native American himself). His music was featured in the HBO movie, 'Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee.'
....- IMDb Mini Biography By: Factchecker

[Sparks]

John Two-Hawks - Personal Background

John Two-Hawks, Oglala Lakota Native American Flute Player, Musician, Actor, Speaker and Activist

That second line I cannot see directly on the page I linked to. But when I copied and pasted the whole page to edit for an excerpt, it came up as shown in my quote.

I think this is meant to be ambiguous. I guess most people will remember it as a fact that John Two-Hawks is an Oglala Lakota Native American. But if confronted he may say something like: "No, I didn't claim that. I just said I am a player of the "Oglala Lakota Native American Flute"?

[Sparks]

John Two-Hawks has a blog which, it seems, has not been mentioned before in this thread:

https://www.johntwohawks.com/blog — containing several claims of being Lakota, e.g.:

"… our Lakota community …"; "In our Lakota way …", "… the future of our Lakota diet …".

[Schecter]

Ok, what unanswered questions do you have about John? I may have what your looking for.

[RedRightHand]

I don't recall if any of us have posted this, but one of the things Hill / Two Frauds does to try to get an "in" with Natives (and those who innocently want to support Native efforts) is he goes to Native events that are open to the public and films them. He then makes high-quality videos of these events, and misrepresents them as "Native videos".

Then he posts the videos on Facebook, maybe on YouTube and Vimeo, too. They are posted under his fraud name, or other Native-sounding project names. They get shared. As they are passed around by both nons and Natives who want footage of themselves and their friends, people unwittingly follow him on social media. This makes people consciously or unconsciously assume he is either Native, or accepted by Natives, when really all he did was post a video.

Then he uses these contacts to promote himself.

It's all part of the scam. He's still a non-Native exploiter, using any contact with Natives to make money off his misrepresentations of Native cultures.

[Sparks]

The quoted 'Controversy' part has been completely removed from that page:

http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Once_(Nightwish_album)

Controversy
On 5 January 2013, a member of the Nightwish forum discovered the alleged Lakota language spoken in the song "Creek Mary's Blood" is not actually Lakota, only spoken gibberish, and stated that John Two-Hawks is a fraud.[37] There are other claims that John Two-Hawks broke the Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990 truth in advertising law by "advertising his music as Native American, and himself as a Native American artisan." John Two-Hawks denied these claims and said that the poem spoken in Creek Mary's Blood has a lot of errors, even though he had a "fluent friend" check to see if the poem has no errors. John Two-Hawks also said that he is Native American though he is not in any Native American tribe.[38] The Nightwish forum member went on to post a correct translation of the spoken poem in "Creek Mary's Blood".[38]

I found the same version here, although without references to footnotes:

https://alchetron.com/Once-(Nightwish-album)

Controversy
On 5 January 2013, a member of the Nightwish forum discovered the Lakota language spoken in the song Creek Mary's Blood is not the real language, only spoken gibberish, and even made claims that John Two-Hawks is a fraud. There are other claims that John Two-Hawks broke the Indian Arts Act of 1990 law by "advertising his music as Native American, and himself as a Native American artisan." John Two-Hawks denied these claims and said that the poem spoken in Creek Mary's Blood has a lot of errors, even though he had a "fluent friend" check to see if the poem has no errors. John Two-Hawks also said that he is Native American though he is not in any Indian tribe. The Nightwish forum member even posts the real translation of the spoken poem in Creek Mary's Blood.

[Diana]

Here's a prime example of this John Allen Hill insinuating himself in the Big foot memorial ride. It looks like he even pretends to have actual family there with the captions of his pictures. This is absolutely appalling.


https://m.facebook.com/johntwohawks

I don't recall if any of us have posted this, but one of the things Hill / Two Frauds does to try to get an "in" with Natives (and those who innocently want to support Native efforts) is he goes to Native events that are open to the public and films them. He then makes high-quality videos of these events, and misrepresents them as "Native videos".

Then he posts the videos on Facebook, maybe on YouTube and Vimeo, too. They are posted under his fraud name, or other Native-sounding project names. They get shared. As they are passed around by both nons and Natives who want footage of themselves and their friends, people unwittingly follow him on social media. This makes people consciously or unconsciously assume he is either Native, or accepted by Natives, when really all he did was post a video.

Then he uses these contacts to promote himself.

It's all part of the scam. He's still a non-Native exploiter, using any contact with Natives to make money off his misrepresentations of Native cultures.

[educatedindian]

I'm writing a book on Native metal and punk, also a chapter on bands writing songs about Natives. The whole episode of Hill and Nightwish is described. Here's what will be in the book:

Nightwish “Creek Mary’s Blood”
   Nightwish are a symphonic metal band from Finland. “Creek Mary’s Blood” appears on their most successful album in the US, Once. Four other songs on it were singles, but “Creek” was not, though it was naively praised by many non Natives then.
      Nightwish made the mistake of featuring John Allen Hill AKA “John Two Hawks,” a white  imposter and ceremony seller who has made a career out of posing as a Native. In the song he speaks gibberish that was supposed to be Lakota. The live video has him “chiefing,” acting in the cheesiest most stereotyped way to appeal to whites. 
   The song is lush, synthesizers and orchestra, starting with flutes and wind. The novel Creek Mary’s Blood was written by a white American historian, Dee Brown, best known for the famous history book Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee. The novel is an old woman’s telling of the Trail of Tears and other Muscogee Creek history.
       Nightwish’s song does not repeat the hateful imagining of Natives not being alive anymore: “Soon I will be here no more/You`ll hear my tale…Through my people.” They also describe Native origins: “Once we were here/Where we have lived since the world began/Since time itself gave us this land…Our home in peace and war and death.”
   But then comes the imposter Hill’s ugly and obviously New Age lies:

“I still dream every night/Of them wolves, them mustangs, those endless prairies
The unspoilt frontier of my kith n` kin,The hallowed land of the Great Spirit…
In every day I am like the caribou, You like the wolves that make me stronger"

   Why would a song supposedly about Muscogee people describe mustangs, caribou, and prairie, none of them in Creek homelands? Why a term used by whites many years ago, “kith n kin?” Hill then made an obvious mistake saying the Great Spirit, a Plains tribe term, when Muscogee have been Baptist Christians for two centuries.
      Finally he repeats a New Age story passed off as Native online. Supposedly, “There are two wolves fighting within me. The one that wins is the one I feed.” This silly nonsense is pure New Age, but the naive sometimes fall for it as Native and “profound.”
     You could argue a Finnish band had no way of knowing he was a fraud. This is false. It’s as easy to find out as doing a Google search. Or even easier, noticing his obvious tanning makeup, his skin color at his hairline several shades lighter. To their credit, Nightwish admitted they were taken in, apologized, and some videos with the imposter were even taken down. None of that stopped New Age idiots defending him.