Area of study 4: World music

Background information Comes from Bukino Faso in West Africa music plays an important role in society used to communicate many feelings and emotions used at social gatherings: celebration for harvests, birthdays, weddings, funerals, gathering of chiefs music passed down through generations through the oral tradition music often combined with speech and dance, falls broadly into 3 strands: drumming, choral song and instrumental

Common features of African music: ostinati improvisation cyclic structures polyphony cross rhythms intertwining melodies

Instruments: Balaphon - wooden xylophone Flue - made from bamboo/horn Djembe - drum Dundun - drum Maracas - shakers Talking drum Vocals Agogo - cow bell

Categories of instruments: Idiophones (resorant/solid) - balaphons, maracas Aerophones (wind) - flutes Membranophones (membranes/skins) - djembe, dundun, talking drum Chordophones (strings) - lutes (not used in this piece)

Yiri by Koko

3 main ideas are used: the balaphon ostinati - in combination, they produce a complex polyphonic scale vocal line - simple pentatonic call and response structure drum ostinati - play the same 1 bar pattern - little variation

Structure: Intro balaphon - chorus A1 balaphon - chorus A2 solo with choral responses chorus B1 - chorus B2 balaphon - chorus A3 balaphon - CODA

Devices used in this piece: syncopation improvisation - at the start tremolo - balaphon at the start call and response - between solo and chorus vocables - nonsense syllables

Rag Desh

Background information: piece is from North India based on 3 elements: melody (raga), rhythm (tala) and drone. structure: alap, jhor, jhala, gat (but if the piece is vocal then gat is called bandish)

Instruments: sitar - guitar like tabla - drums voice sarangi - uses a bow sarod - smaller and lower than a sitar pakhawaj - double headed drum cymbals bansuri - wooden flute esraj - bowed and fretted tambura - provides the drone

Structure: ALAP: sitar player introduces notes of the chosen raga (indian scale/melody) improvising freely No beat/pulse, the only accompaniment is the tambura drone JHOR JHALA GAT/BANDISH: tabla player comes in pre-composed, not improvised gat - instruments only bandish - with vocals some improvisation musical ideas passed around in a sort of musical question and answer

The melody - the rag: set melody on which the music is improvised like a scale - rag ascends/descends but pitches differ in either direction number of notes: 5-8 each rag has a particular mood associated with it. learnt through oral tradition the rag we are studying is called Rag Desh tonic: C rag desh: C D F G B C Bb A G F E D C traditionally a night raga also linked to rainy seasons/monsoon

Drone main emphasis is on melody drone usually uses tonic and dominant of the chosen rag played by the tambura adds sense of tuning/intonation adds to the texture of the music as a whole sitar player works improvs around tambura

Rhythm - the tala: played on the tabla tala has a set number of beats called matras first beat of the tala: sam rhythms start and end on a sam talas are different - length depends on mood of raga jhaptal: 10 beat tala tintal: 16 beat raga keherwa tal: 8 beat tala rupak tal: 7 beat tala ektal tal: 12 beat tala

Anoushka Shankar (sitar): uses sitar and tabla alap, gat 1, gat 2 alap: sitar and tabla only. Sitar plucks, strums and bends notes gat 1: jhaptal (10 beat tala) gat 2: tintal (16 beat tala) final part: sitar strums the drone strings

Mhara janam maran by Chiranji LalTanwar (voice): uses voice, sarangi, cymbals, tabla, sarod and pakhawaj alap then bandish tala: keherwa tal (8 beat tala) sarod and sarangi have solos singer uses a lot of vibrato

Benji Wertheimer (esraj and tabla) and Steve Gorn (bansuri): uses bansuri, esraj, tambura and tabla alap, gat 1 (slow), gat 2 (fast) rupak tal (7 beat tabla) ektal tal (12 beat tabla)

Yiri by Koko

Rag Desh