Native American and African Music Links

This song "Din Din Wo (Little Child") is by Habib Koite & Bamada, a really cool Malian group. What's pretty unique about Habib Koite is that he tunes his guitar to the pentatonic scale and sings songs in English, French (Mali used to be a French colony), and Bambara (the language of Mali). His songs strongly demonstrate syncretism. If you like this, it's from their album entitled Muso Ko. I also suggest listening to "I Ka Barra (Your Work)"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-ZiZnycnWY

This is definitely something that I think you should watch!!

I just copied and pasted what what written about the video...

Radio Biso na Biso is the first community radio station to broadcast in the 12 indigenous languages spoken in the FSC-certified concessions of Congolaise Industrielle des Bois in Northern Congo-Brazzaville. In addition to celebrating these unique cultures, oral traditions and musical styles, the radio station gives local indigenous people a platform to discuss and learn about the issues they face in the context of industrial forestry operations, and about the need for the company to obtain their free, prior and informed consent to operations in their traditional forest areas.

Biso na Biso is recruiting journalists from each indigenous group in the concession to produce programmes in local languages that speak to peoples concerns and interests. This video shows one of these journalists, the Ba.Aka Paul Aboyo, alias Mandero, journaliste internationale, making one of his first programmes for Biso na Biso.

The highlight of this video is when Mandero brings in indigenous people to play some of their music to broadcast on the radio. It's really neat!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vKZVETgJYk

Here is a clip of a Navajo feather dance:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NHFgzX7c48

I haven't had abundant encounters with performing music from other cultures, but what I have had the opportunity to perform has been very memorable to me. I think I remember them all so well is because my director emphasized the overwhelming importance of performing other cultures' music. Oddly enough, all the songs that I have sung that are from outside the Western culture have all been choral pieces, I have never sung one as a solo. I feel like that gives it a richer experience, to be sharing an unfamiliar musical style, text, etc.

One of the choral pieces that I did when I was at district chorus in high school was called "Veneki, Birth Switches." It's a Russian favorite, but it literally translates into nothing. There are some references to brooms; it is sung in Russia purely out of tradition, but is not in the least bit comprehensible. I'm sure the funniest part for our director was listening to us all trying to pronounce the language, luckily it was very repetative. In my junior year of high school, I had the most wonderful experience of attending the All-Virginia All State Choir. My director was Dr. Janet Galvan, who teaches at Ithaca College in New York. What was so fabulous about this woman was that she believed it was not only recommended, but necessary, to diversify our musical repertoire. In my opinion, the most interesting song we sang was called "Hoj, Hura Hoj." It is translated "O, Mountain O" and it is a Movarian Czech song by Otmar Macha. There was three soloists choosen, and Dr. Galvan specified that they needed to be as close to straight tone as possible (with little or no vibrato). I'm assuming that that is the Czech style of singing. The summer before my senior year, I went to a conference for the American Choral Director's Association. Obviously, I'm not a chorus director, but my old voice teacher was a member, so she sent me to sing in the choir that was going to perform at the end of the conference. One of the songs chosen was called "The Children's Revolution." It was the big piece at the end of the performance, it included the Children's Choir, the students, and the teachers. Needless to say, the stage was very crowded. Although parts of the songs are in English, there were sections of it that were sung in Swahili, which is an African language. "The Children's Revolution" contains the Swahili language to show what the chidren sing in that section of Africa. That was when I discovered that Swahili is one of the most beautiful languages to sing. There are so many distinct "clicking noises" used in African languages that give it this unique coloring and meaning.