African JAG
Chapter3
African Rhythm shakes the earth and connects the sky and the earth.
【South Africa】A black old guy who had gained freedom in South Africa after the Apart hate ended pounded out the beat with his drum in between his legs. He said “It is now an instrument but it used to be a way to communicate in the old days”.
【Nigeria】Drummers on Buterdrum showed us how they play it. The rhythms are meant to communicate with the Gods and it has been that way since the ancient times. The rhythm for sacrifice, the rhythm for the Thunder God, and the rhythm to celebrate rich harvest. These rhythms resonate with the red soil in harmony. Then all the sudden, the sky darkened and we heard a rumbling thunder. Big drops of rain started to fall.
【Nigeria】As the tone of Talking drum change, words of children also change. It is a conversation between drums and children. The drum master smiled. I remember things that my friend told me long time ago about the sound of Talking drums.In Congo (ex-Zaire) during the rain reason roads were turned into rivers temporarily. While going up rivers in canoe there used to be sounds of drums coming from both sides of a river. It was such a joyous sounds of talking drums having conversations under the sky full of starts.
People of Bayefall live on top of the highest hill of the island, and they play djembe twice a day, once at noon and once at six o’clock in the evening with their dread locked hair and patch worked outfit. We can hear their gentle rhythm from all over island in a genial sunshine. These rhythms symbolize the wish for a lasting peace on the island.
【Senegal】Goree Island is located in the eastern end of Africa. European colonial powers fought over the control of this island during the colonial era. Countless African people were shipped off to the Western countries as slaves from this island. The Slave House still remains on this island. All the European and American tourists visit The Slave House. They all look serious and many of them burst into a fit of weeping while they are inside of the house. Once they step out of the house they immediately start chatting and laughing. “That’s life” I heard my Senegalese friend said.
【Senegal】There is a club created by the world famous musician, Youssou N”Dour in Dakar. Every weekend there are live music shows. When I visited the club, it was a night of drum sessions. All unknown drummers and it was a session of two small size talking drum players and three djembe players. The vigorous performance was just overwhelming with power. The audience was all local black people and the whole experience was a total madness!
【Eritrea】The first beat that I encountered in Africa reminded me of Japanese traditional summer festival music and dance called Bon Odori. The way Eritrean dance is to dance with the rhythm of the chorus leader. It is such a joyous sight to see them dance. I remember that the hotel we stayed in Ethiopia played music of Japanese female singer, Harumi Miyako. It seemed very strange to me.
【Mali】Balafon that are made of old woods play gentle tones. Balafons look like xylophone but Balafones have gourds with sand in them underneath the strips of wood pieces. People control scales with the amount of sand in gourds. When I banged dry piece of woods of Balafon with a wooden stick with a rubber band wrapped on the tip, Children smiled.
【Malawi】I was surprised at hearing Malawian music because it sounded so similar to Caribbean music.When I mentioned it to my Malawian friends, they said that people from Malawi must have migrated to Caribbean islands. They laughed.
【Malawi】In the small village in Malawi, there is no electricity and no running water. And half of the village population is affected by AIDS. So there are many AIDS orphans as a result. And many of AIDS orphans create their own instruments. For example, one made a guitar with a wooded stick and a tin can with some strings, others made xylophone with driftwoods. Some plays drums made of tin cans. Kids form bands with such instruments and perform on the street.
【South Africa】Tears kept filling my eyes when I first heard her song. I didn’t understand the language that she was singing in so there was not way that I could understand what she was singing about. The song sounded like piece of someone’s soul. I later learned that the song was about a mother who escaped abroad alone, leaving a daughter behind while the apart hate was still in effect in South Africa. The song was written for the daughter from the mother. The lyrics go like this “You are not the only one who suffer. Your mother is lonely, too.” Her dream was to sing this song in her own language.
【South Africa】Kids in Soweto learned to express themselves in the newly acquired music style, Rap. Rap music was imported to South Africa after the Apart hate ended. Young people delivering massages so powerful and vividly true to life through Rap music. That gave me goose bumps. The town turned into slums and became very dangerous. But I heard the true massages from the young generation, shouting “Soweto! Soweto!” Their messages were for real. Their eyes were so true. I felt that Soweto was the hottest town in the whole world.
【Africa】Wherever you go, you will find music at the center of the people.Even in a small towns where there is no running water, you will hear drums, then people start dancing to the drums, everybody, the young people to the elderly, starts to shake their hips. They don’t care if they have no Television set, no computers, and no cell phones. No matter how poor they are there is a space that people dance in and music that people dance to, and music brings smiles to all of us.For the people in Africa, music and dancing are language they speak, piece of their minds that they can relax in, sadness they share, and connection between the past and the future. Music and dancing is the only one “light” of their lives as it could be the only one way to archive the African Dream for the poor people.
My own African Dream is to gather all the top musicians and dancers from all 53 nations of Africa, and have the competition to select the number 1 African musician and African dancer. Then the selected number 1 group will tour the world. Some day I hope my African dream will come true.
※ Reproducing all or any part of the contents of this site is prohibited without author's permission.
