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All over the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, Indigenous artists are celebrating and expanding the rich history of Alaska Native culture by adding their signature touches to traditional designs and artwork.KYUK is profiling some of the creators, designers and innovators who call the region home.

Yup’ik singer-songwriter builds connections throughout rural Alaska using social media

‘Village Life’ is the first song Martin Paul ever wrote. It’s about the ups and downs of life where he grew up - between Kalskag and Kipnuk on the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta.
Martin Paul
"Village Life" is the first song Martin Paul ever wrote. It’s about the ups and downs of life where he grew up - between Kalskag and Kipnuk on the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta.

Singer-songwriter and college student Martin Paul uses his social media presence on TikTok and Instagram to highlight the ups and downs of life in Alaska’s remote communities. And his song lyrics are honest. These are the first few lines of one of the first songs Paul ever wrote.

“... walking down that village road, 
hearing them drunks yelling in their homes. 
We don’t need to be out this late,
But who cares? I don’t, we make mistakes…”

Paul sings about garbage, unruly dogs, and the impact of alcohol abuse. He also sings about what makes a village home.

“One thing I know that has stuck with me
Is that unfailing love the village gives to me.”

Paul, who’s 20 years old, grew up between Kipnuk and Kalskag. He also spent time in Kotzebue. He said that music has always played an outsized role in his life. “Singing was also a very, very big part of my family – on both sides of my family, my mom’s side and my dad’s side,” Paul said.

Paul said that his family sang in choirs, at church, and in school.

“I remember, like, being a kid, both of my grandmas, I'd be in church and I wouldn't be singing. And they’d look at me and they’d be like, ‘You should sing. Sing, come on and sing. Get out of your comfort zone and just sing. Sing loud.’ And they’d be like, ‘I can’t even hear you,'" Paul laughed.

Paul credits his love for celebrating and sharing his Yup’ik traditions and culture to his grade school culture teacher Julia Dorris. “She really encouraged me to keep on doing it even if I was horrible,” he said. “At the time, she was like, ‘You’re doing so good,' so she was really, really encouraging. She’s like my grandma too, so…”

Last fall, when Paul tried out for the nationally-televised talent show American Idol, Dorris gushed over her former student. “He’s that kind of boy. He wants to just learn more of his own language and just everything else that has to do with your Native culture. I’m so proud of that. And especially that he's going to study further the language,” she said.

Paul is a college student at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, majoring in Biology with a minor in the Yup’ik language. In the last year, Paul has most certainly tested his comfort zone. He was one of four Alaska-based contestants who tried out for American Idol.

What grounded him, Paul said, is the cauyaq – the Yup’ik drum he played during his audition. The cauyaq also plays a prominent role in the song he performed during the audition.

“Play my drum everyday, 
just trying to make sense of what’s going on today,
I don’t know how I feel, but I keep on going…”

“I wrote that song in English, originally, and it talks about the hardships I had and one of the most depressing moments in my life to, like, where I was suicidal,” Paul said. “And I took that song and I thought about it, and I looked at my drum and was like, you know, the Yup’ik drum saved my life growing up because it was always there, even before my guitar and before I started writing music,” he said. “Literally, the cauyaq saved my life because it was an outlet for me to express my emotion and something about it always makes me feel good inside.”

With that realization, Paul said that he decided to experiment. “And I was like, ‘I wonder what it would be like to write a song that transitions into, like, the traditional Yuraq song?’” he said.

The chorus of his song is in Yugtun – an ode to the cauyaq and the Yup’ik heritage that kept him moving forward. Yup’ik traditions and culture are at the core of everything Paul creates, but not everything he presents is heavy. His social media posts are also filled with humor.

In one of his TikTok videos, Paul is standing in his auntie’s kitchen in Upper Kalskag.

Videos posted to Martin Paul’s TikTok account are filled with humorous and honest commentaries on Indigenous life in rural Alaska, including this one from his Auntie’s kitchen in Upper Kalskag.
Martin Paul
Videos posted to Martin Paul’s TikTok account are filled with humorous and honest commentaries on Indigenous life in rural Alaska, including this one from his auntie’s kitchen in Upper Kalskag.

“Things that Natives say that just make a hundred percent sense,” Paul tells the camera with a wry smile. Then he speaks in a mocking voice. “Yeah, I sometimes always do that… yeah, I sometimes always… sometimes always… I don’t even know how to don’t anymore,” and he laughs to himself.

The setting itself includes all the details of daily life in Western Alaska’s remote villages. A large pot for canning food sits on a high shelf. Coats and jackets hang on wall hooks next to the door behind him. And the audience response was wild: lots of laughing and clapping emojis from people in nearby villages who could relate.

His feeds are also filled with lots of heartwarming videos, including one he made thanks to a special request from a young cousin. “Can you sing ‘All My Sunshine?’” asks a little voice from somewhere off camera. Paul nods, and then tells his cousin that they will have to sing with him. He starts strumming his guitar and launches into some lyrics he wrote himself:

“12 a.m. in the morning and I'm sitting on my grandpa’s couch.
Singing them great old tunes that I’ve been thinking so much about.
I know I should just be in bed, I’ve got to go to school,
But how do I sleep when we’ve got these good old tunes…”

Martin Paul’s social media content on TikTok and Instagram has garnered thousands of comments, likes, and shares. The content includes heartwarming sing-alongs with family, as well as honest storytelling about life in rural Alaska.
Emily Schwing
Martin Paul’s social media content on TikTok and Instagram has garnered thousands of comments, likes, and shares. The content includes heartwarming sing-alongs with family, as well as honest storytelling about life in rural Alaska.

And then the two of them, Paul and his young cousin, sing two rounds of “You Are My Sunshine” together. The video ends with a high-five and positive encouragement from Paul for his cousin.

After he posted this video, the comments section on Paul’s TikTok post exploded with lots of emotional responses. Paul said that this is exactly what music is supposed to do: offer a sense of healing, joy, and gratitude.

He has nearly 200,000 followers on TikTok with more than 8 million likes. Over on Instagram, his account is nearing 10,000 followers. It’s likely that audience will continue to grow.

Paul’s summer is packed with plans. He performed at an inaugural music festival in Nome. He will also teach Yuraq at two camps in villages on the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta before he heads back to school in the fall, where he’s sure to keep his audience entertained and informed with his music, experiences, and a whole lot of cauyaq and Yup’ik culture.

This reporting was made possible through the CIRI Foundation’s Journey to What Matters grant program.

Emily Schwing is a long-time Alaska-based reporter.