Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
8.2.11
Review: 'Brass Bands and the Beni Phenomenon in Urban Eastern Africa'
Hello, classmates... and Jack.
This blog-post is going to be a review of the paper 'Brass Bands and the Beni Phenomenon in Urban Eastern Africa', which can be found in African Music vol. 7, no. 1. It will start with an overview of what the article is about, and end with some of my thoughts regarding articles like this one.
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The paper aims to investigate the impact of European military brass music on Tanganyika, through the rise and fall of beni ngoma. And what was beni ngoma, you may be asking? Beni ngoma was the word used to describe the many different East African dance band traditions.
It is argued that beni ngoma arose from the influence of German and then British military brass music. In the late nineteenth century, German military operations had commenced in Tanganyika, heavily in the city of Dar es Salaam. Musical interplay between the German settlers and local askari bands - African recruits in the German military -led to unique, new sounds. Though, it is worth noting, Europeans tended to be critical of the local music, seeing European music as more elite, and civilising. After the First World War, Britain took control of Tanganyika, and band music enjoyed a similar cultural interplay as it did under German rule. Eventually, a full military band ensemble began performing in 1906, as a part of the King's African Rifles. Eventually, by 1919, band music was coming to the fore of East African music.
The author asserts that, in general, African beni was particularly special because of the cultural interplay it had experienced, and that it "drew upon African, European, and even Arabic elements which were all mixed variously, depending upon where in East Africa this phenomenon was found". Also, due to beni ngoma's military background, the dances that accompanied the music were sometimes military themed. Moreover, unlike when Europeans first encountered African music, they enjoyed the sound of the multi-faceted beni ngoma. In fact, beni ngoma became so popular that various competitive dance associations emerged.
However, the author notes that by the mid-1930s beni ngoma's popularity had begun to decline. The pageantry, flourish and innovation of the earlier days were subsiding. This decline happened for a number of reasons. Firstly, economic depression had hit Tanganyika, and thus organisations no longer had the funds to perform; secondly, beni was simply going out of fashion; and thirdly, as beni slowly lost support, new forms of dance began to take its place.
Ultimately, the author thinks beni ngoma should be lauded as it was the first multi-ethnic form of music in Tanganyika, and that it helped build bridges between different African ethnicities, and possibly between African ethnicities and Europeans.
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Overall, i enjoyed reading this article. I find cultural history like this, which is on such a detailed level, and involves itself with the experiences of people on the ground, humanises the study of history. This, i think is important, as i find history often loses its ability to sympathise with the people it is looking at.
To me, it is this - accounting for the person on the ground, and understanding their unique perspective - that is a requisite of good history. Yes, we can look at the history of economics, and yes, we can look at the history of politics, etc. But, ultimately, these types of history cannot be properly understood without accounting for the people behind them.
Afterall, we make our own history.
-Pala Gilroy Sen
This blog-post is going to be a review of the paper 'Brass Bands and the Beni Phenomenon in Urban Eastern Africa', which can be found in African Music vol. 7, no. 1. It will start with an overview of what the article is about, and end with some of my thoughts regarding articles like this one.
___
The paper aims to investigate the impact of European military brass music on Tanganyika, through the rise and fall of beni ngoma. And what was beni ngoma, you may be asking? Beni ngoma was the word used to describe the many different East African dance band traditions.
It is argued that beni ngoma arose from the influence of German and then British military brass music. In the late nineteenth century, German military operations had commenced in Tanganyika, heavily in the city of Dar es Salaam. Musical interplay between the German settlers and local askari bands - African recruits in the German military -led to unique, new sounds. Though, it is worth noting, Europeans tended to be critical of the local music, seeing European music as more elite, and civilising. After the First World War, Britain took control of Tanganyika, and band music enjoyed a similar cultural interplay as it did under German rule. Eventually, a full military band ensemble began performing in 1906, as a part of the King's African Rifles. Eventually, by 1919, band music was coming to the fore of East African music.
The author asserts that, in general, African beni was particularly special because of the cultural interplay it had experienced, and that it "drew upon African, European, and even Arabic elements which were all mixed variously, depending upon where in East Africa this phenomenon was found". Also, due to beni ngoma's military background, the dances that accompanied the music were sometimes military themed. Moreover, unlike when Europeans first encountered African music, they enjoyed the sound of the multi-faceted beni ngoma. In fact, beni ngoma became so popular that various competitive dance associations emerged.
However, the author notes that by the mid-1930s beni ngoma's popularity had begun to decline. The pageantry, flourish and innovation of the earlier days were subsiding. This decline happened for a number of reasons. Firstly, economic depression had hit Tanganyika, and thus organisations no longer had the funds to perform; secondly, beni was simply going out of fashion; and thirdly, as beni slowly lost support, new forms of dance began to take its place.
Ultimately, the author thinks beni ngoma should be lauded as it was the first multi-ethnic form of music in Tanganyika, and that it helped build bridges between different African ethnicities, and possibly between African ethnicities and Europeans.
___
Overall, i enjoyed reading this article. I find cultural history like this, which is on such a detailed level, and involves itself with the experiences of people on the ground, humanises the study of history. This, i think is important, as i find history often loses its ability to sympathise with the people it is looking at.
To me, it is this - accounting for the person on the ground, and understanding their unique perspective - that is a requisite of good history. Yes, we can look at the history of economics, and yes, we can look at the history of politics, etc. But, ultimately, these types of history cannot be properly understood without accounting for the people behind them.
Afterall, we make our own history.
-Pala Gilroy Sen
7.2.11
Music and dance now
Shangaan music (South Africa)
No idea what this song is called.
Sample youtube comment: "I would hope the two people that disliked this have teamed up and are on a fierce mission as I type to hunt down whoever cracked open their ribcages and stole their souls."
Zinja Hlungwani - Nwa Gezani My Love
Kuduro (Angola)
Mixtape
Buraka Som Sistema, Sound of Kuduro
Kuduro is an interesting example of African music being repackaged and repurposed for western markets.
No idea what this song is called.
Sample youtube comment: "I would hope the two people that disliked this have teamed up and are on a fierce mission as I type to hunt down whoever cracked open their ribcages and stole their souls."
Zinja Hlungwani - Nwa Gezani My Love
Kuduro (Angola)
Mixtape
Buraka Som Sistema, Sound of Kuduro
Kuduro is an interesting example of African music being repackaged and repurposed for western markets.
Fela Kuti and Afrobeat
Links from Vikki Page.
Clip from Konkombe: The Nigerian Pop Music Scene.
Army Arrangement
1971 Performance
Fela Kuti documentary:
Clip from Konkombe: The Nigerian Pop Music Scene.
Army Arrangement
1971 Performance
Fela Kuti documentary:
South African Jazz
Links from Patricia Okello.
King Kong: the Musical
The Manhattan Brothers - Laku Tshoni 'Ilanga (1954)
The Jazz Epistles - Vary-oo-vum
King Kong: the Musical
The Manhattan Brothers - Laku Tshoni 'Ilanga (1954)
The Jazz Epistles - Vary-oo-vum
25.7.10
The Blues
In Blues music, we can see an important example of the global network of cultural flows in and out of Africa that spans several centuries in its evolution.
It was born in America's Deep South at the end of the 19th century, when African-Americans drew on spirituals and work songs, often from slave traditions, to form a new style of narrative ballad. This in turn would provide the basis for many of the major musical forms of the 20th century. As a style, it is difficult to overstate the importance of the Blues. Its roots, in the slave communities of the centuries preceding its invention, can be traced back to West Africa. Although there is a distinct European influence in its structure, influence of vocal call-and-response traditions, as well as the narrative of oral story-telling, are a direct legacy of the Slave Coast. Additionally, the Blues' earliest instruments - the banjo and diddley bow (a one-stringed instrument) - are considered to be directly derived from West African musical family.
Here are underground cartoonist Robert Crumb's portraits of African-American blues heroes Skip James and Blind Willie Johnson:
Blind Willie Johnson singing 'God Moves on the Water'
and Skip James singing 'Devil Got My Woman'.
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