Thousands gather in New Mexico for the largest powwow in North America

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Thousands of people are gathering in New Mexico for a celebration showcasing Native American and Indigenous dancers, musicians and artisans from around the world.

Billed by organizers as the largest powwow in North America, the annual Gathering of Nations festival kicked off Friday with a colorful procession of dancers spiraling into the center of an arena at the New Mexico state fairgrounds.

Participants wear elaborate regalia — some with jingling bells and others with feathers. They dance to the tempo of rhythmic drumming, each coming to the gathering for their own reasons.

“It's not just for show,” said Deshava Apachee, who is Mescalero Apache and Navajo. “It’s for healing, it’s for strength, it’s for reconnecting.”

The event also features the crowning of Miss Indian World, as well as horse parades in which riders are judged on the craftsmanship of their intricately beaded adornments or feathered headdresses and how well they work with their horses.

Powwows are a relatively modern phenomenon that emerged in the 1800s as the U.S. government seized land from tribes throughout the Northern and Southern Plains. Forced migrations and upheaval during this period resulted in intertribal solidarity among Plains people and those from the southern prairies of Canada.

Alliances were formed, giving way to the exchange of songs and dances during gatherings between different tribes. In the decades that followed, powwows were advertised to pioneers heading westward as “authentic” Native American dance shows. For some, it was an exploitation of their cultures.

The word powwow was derived from pau wau, an Algonquian Narrtick word for “medicine man,” according to the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage. Scholars say English settlers misused the word to refer to the meetings of medicine men and later to any kind of Native American gathering.

Today, some of the large powwows like the Gathering of Nations have become more commercialized events that use dancing and drumming competitions, with prize money at stake, to provide a glimpse into Indigenous cultures.

At ceremonial dances, participants wear traditional regalia specific to their tribe, whereas powwow attire often is more contemporary and flashy with sequins and sparkles. It is about dressing to impress the judges, said Warren Queton, a Kiowa Tribe legislator and adjunct instructor at the University of Oklahoma who has participated in community dancing and cultural events since he was a boy.

Queton, who served as the head gourd dancer at the university's recent spring powwow, said ceremonial dances are deeply rooted in community, identity and cultural values.

It is a struggle to keep traditional cultural practices and commercial powwows from being lumped into the same category, he said. Powwow ways and ceremonial traditions have different meanings in Native American and Indigenous cultures.

There has been a focus on promoting smaller powwows held in tribal communities. Queton said these gatherings serve as a way for people who live elsewhere to return home and reconnect with their families and the land, and to share traditions with younger generations.

“Knowing where you come from, your land, your oral traditions, your language, but also values and traits — that can only be learned from a community,” he said. “That’s why those smaller dances are so important because people learn those community values. They’re all a part of our identity.”

There still are elements of tradition woven in to modern powwows. Competitors wear feathered bustles, buckskin dresses, fringed shawls and beaded head and hair pieces. Some of the elaborate outfits are hand-stitched designs that can take months to complete.

The sounds, movements and emotions that radiate from the dancing are challenging to capture on canvas. But Cochiti Pueblo painter Mateo Romero did just that when he partnered with the U.S. Postal Service to create a series of powwow stamps unveiled Friday during Gathering of Nations.

Powerfully hypnotic, atavistic and somatic is how the artist describes the dancing. One of his pieces depicts what is known as a fancy shawl dance with its dips, pivots, hops and twirls. Each tassel on the shawl flows and flips, accentuating the dancer's movements.

Romero said he used color, thick and thin paint and soft and hard edges along with photographic elements to create something that feels alive, embedded with feeling and bright pops of color.

Romero called it a huge honor to transform powwow culture into a postage stamp filled with “good energy.”

“I look at it as a sort of vehicle to express this sentiment, the energy, the celebration, the vibration, the beauty of it,” he said. “It’s the power of it.”

This article corrects the spelling of the last name of Deshava Apachee

Miss Southern Ute Maleina Carel waves to the crowd as she participates in the horse parade at the annual Gathering of Nations powwow in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on Friday, May 25, 2025 (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan)

A participant in the Gathering of Nations horse parade waves to the crowd at the state fairgrounds in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on Friday, May 25, 2025 (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan)

Christian Rangel, who is Navajo and Cherokee and from Tulsa, Oklahoma, talks about the work that went into making his bustle following the grand entry procession during the annual Gathering of Nations powwow in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Friday, May 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan)

A dancer takes part in the grand entry during the annual Gathering of Nations powwow in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Friday, May 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan)

2025 Miss Indian World contestants join the grand entry procession during the annual Gathering of Nations powwow in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Friday, May 25, 2025 .(AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan)

Native American and Indigenous dancers pack an arena during a grand entry procession at the annual Gathering of Nations powwow in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Friday, May 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan)

Native American and Indigenous dancers take part in a grand entry procession at the annual Gathering of Nations powwow in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on Friday, May 25, 2025 (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan)

FILE - Shane Redhawk who is Sicangu Lakota leads a horse parade at the 40th anniversary of the Gathering of Nations Pow Wow in Albuquerque, N.M., Friday, April 28, 2023. (AP Photo/Roberto E. Rosales, File)

BASEL, Switzerland (AP) — There has already been triumph and tears, singing onstage and in the streets, and a touch of political division, as the 69th Eurovision Song Contest approaches its grand final in the Swiss city of Basel.

Musical acts from 26 countries will take the stage at the St. Jakobshalle arena on Saturday in a spectacular, sequin-drenched competition that has been uniting and dividing Europeans since 1956.

Here’s everything to know:

Eurovision is competition in which performers from countries across Europe, and a few beyond it, compete under their national flags with the aim of being crowned continental champion. Think of it as the Olympics of pop music or the World Cup with singing instead of soccer.

It’s a celebration of silly fun and music’s unifying power, but also a place where politics and regional rivalries play out.

“It’s Europe’s biggest cultural event,” said Dean Vuletic, an expert on the history of Eurovision. “It has been going on for almost 70 years and people love to watch it, not only for the show, for the glitter, the stage effects, the crazy costumes, but also because they like to see it as a reflection of the zeitgeist in Europe.”

Of 37 countries that sent performers to Eurovision, 11 were knocked out by public voting in semifinals on Tuesday and Thursday. Another six automatically qualified for the final: the host, Switzerland, and the “Big Five” that pay the most to the contest — France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the U.K.

The 26 countries competing Saturday, in order of performance, are: Norway, Luxembourg, Estonia, Israel, Lithuania, Spain, Ukraine, the U.K, Austria, Iceland, Latvia, the Netherlands, Finland, Italy, Poland, Germany, Greece, Armenia, Switzerland, Malta, Portugal, Denmark, Sweden, France, San Marino and Albania.

Favorites, according to oddsmakers, are KAJ, representing Sweden with “Bara Bada Bastu,” a jaunty serenade to the sauna. Dutch singer Claude is also highly rated with soulful ballad “C’est La Vie.” Other favorites include classically trained Austrian countertenor JJ with his pop-opera song “Wasted Love,” and Israel’s Yuval Raphael, with her anthemic “New Day Will Rise.”

Eurovision has a reputation for campy europop with nonsense lyrics — past winners include “La, La, La” and “Boom Bang-a-Bang.” But It has also produced some enduring pop classics. And it helped make stars of performers including ABBA — winners in 1974 with “Waterloo” — Celine Dion, Austrian drag performer Conchita Wurst and Italian rock band Måneskin.

This year’s finalists range from Lithuanian emo rockers Katarsis to a power ballad Spanish diva Melody and Ukrainian prog rockers Ziferblat.

Campiness, humor and double entendres abound. “Espresso Macchiato” is a comic ode to Italian stereotypes performed by Estonia’s Tommy Cash. Miriana Conte sings for Malta with the double entendre-filled “Serving” -- performed on a set including a glitter ball and giant lips, it is classic Eurovision.

It was once widely accepted that the most successful Eurovision songs were in English, but that is changing. This year’s contest features songs in a record 20 languages, including Ukrainian, Icelandic, Latvian, Maltese and Armenian.

Vuletic said viewers these days want “more authenticity in Eurovision entries.

“They don’t just want a standard pop song sung in English,” he said. “They want to also see something about the culture of the country that the song represents.”

Once all the acts have performed in the final, the winner is chosen by a famously complex mix of phone and online voters from around the world and rankings by music-industry juries in each of the Eurovision countries. As the results are announced, countries slide up and down the rankings and tensions build.

Ending up with “nul points,” or zero, is considered a national humiliation.

The final starts Saturday at 1900 GMT (3 p.m. EDT) and will be aired by national broadcasters in participating nations, on streaming service Peacock in the United States and in many countries on the Eurovision YouTube channel.

During and immediately after the final, viewers in participating countries can vote by phone, text message or the Eurovision app — but not for their own country. Viewers in the U.S. and other nonparticipating countries can vote all day Saturday, online at www.esc.vote or with the app. The combined “rest of the world” vote is given the weight of one individual country.

The contest’s motto is “united by music,” but the world’s divisions inevitably intrude.

Russia was banned from Eurovision after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and since then Ukrainian musicians — including 2022 winner Kalush Orchestra — have competed under the shadow of war in the home country.

This year’s contest has been roiled for a second year by disputes over Israel’s participation. Dozens of former participants, including Nemo, have called for Israel to be excluded over its conduct in the war against Hamas in Gaza. Pro-Palestinian and pro-Israel protests have both taken place in Basel, though on a much smaller scale than at last year’s event in Sweden.

A handful of protesters attempted to disrupt a rehearsal by Israeli singer Raphael on Thursday with oversized flags and whistles and were escorted from the arena. Organizers say they have tightened security ahead of the final.

Miriana Conte from Malta performs the song "SERVING" during the second semi-final of the 69th Eurovision Song Contest, in Basel, Switzerland, Thursday, May 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner)

Yuval Raphael from Israel performs the song "New Day Will Rise" during the second semi-final of the 69th Eurovision Song Contest, in Basel, Switzerland, Thursday, May 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner)