Chapter V. Music Among the Africans


CHAPTER V
MUSIC AMONG THE AFRICANS

 

The Many and Varied Kinds of African Slaves-
NoT All Negroes — ^Their Aptitude and Love for
Music — Knowledge and Use of Harmony — ,
Dahomans at Chicago — Rhythm and
Drumming — ^African Instruments

 

So much for modes and moods. The analytical table
in the last chapter showed several variations of both the
major and minor scales, and these variations must be
examined, for upon them, together with rhythmical and
structural characteristics, rest the idioms which have been
referred to as determining the right of the songs of the
American negroes to be called original. These idioms are
the crude material which the slaves brought with them from
their African homes. This, at least, is the conviction of
this writer, and the contention which he hopes to establish
by a study of the intervallic and rhythmical peculiarities
of the songs and by tracing them to their primitive habitat.
Before then, for the sake of orderly argument, it may be
well briefly to inquire into the musical aptitude of the
Africans who created the idioms. Unfortunately, the
inquiry cannot be made as particular as might be desirable,
for want of specific evidence.

The slaves in the Southern States were an amalgamation
of peoples when the songs came into existence. Though
they are spoken of as negroes, there were many among them
who were not racially nigritians. The Slave Coast, from
which the majority of them were brought to America,
was the home of only a fraction of them. Many came from
the interior of the continent. There were some Malays
from Madagascar, some Moors from the northern portion
of the continent. Among the negroes of Africa the diver-
sities of tribe are so great that over a score of different
languages are spoken by them, to say nothing of dialects.

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MUSIC AMONG THE AFRICANS

All was fish that came to the slaver's net. Among the-
Moors brought to America were men who professed the
Mahometan religion and read and wrote Arabic. It is
not impossible that to their influence in this country, or
at any rate to Moorish influence upon the tribes which
furnished the larger quota of American slaves, is due one
of the aberrations from the diatonic scale which is indi-
cated in the table — the presence of the characteristically
Oriental interval called the augmented or superfluous
s econ d.j Among the peoples who crowded the plantations
were Meens, who were of the hue of the so-called red men
of America — i. e., copper-colored. There were also Iboes,
who had tattooed yellow skins. It does not seem to be
possible now to recall all the names of the tributary tribes —
Congos, Agwas, Popos, Cotolies, Feedas, Socos, Awassas,
Aridas, Fonds, Nagos; — who knows now how they differed
one from another, what were their peculiarities of language
and music which may have affected the song which they
helped to create in their second* home? We must, per-
force, generalize when discussing the native capacity for
music of the Africans.

Sir Richard Francis Burton, in his book on West Africa,
says of the music of the Kroomen that "it is monotonous
to a degree, yet they delight in it, and often after a long
and fatiguing day's march will ask permission to 'make
play' and dance and sing till midnight. When hoeing the
ground they do it to the sound of music; in fact, every-
thing is cheered with a song. The traveller should never
forget to carry a tom-tom or some similar instrument, which
will shorten his journey by a fair quarter.'' In his "Lake
Region of Central Africa" (page 291) Burton describes
the natives of East Africa as "admirable timists and no
mean tunists." Wallaschek (page 140), citing Moodie,» says:
"Another still more striking example of the Hottentots'
musical talent was related to Moodie by a German officer.
When the latter happened to play that beautifully pathetic
air of Gluck's, *Che faro senza Euridice,' on his violin, he
was surprised to observe that he was listened to by some

» "Ten Years in South Africa," by John W. D. Moodie, page 228.

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AFRO-AMERICAN FOLKSONGS

Hottentot women with the deepest attention, and that some
of them were even affected to tears. In a day or two after-
ward he heard his favorite melody, with accompaniments,
all over the country wherever his wandering led him. At
first it seems astonishing that there should be Hottentots
apparently endowed with so great a musical gift; it is es-
pecially surprising to hear of their repeating the air with
accompaniments, since the German officer was certainly
not able to play both on his violin at the same time."
Wallaschek then continues: "This statement, however,
will no longer appear to us incredible if compared with
similar examples in the accounts of some other travellers.
Theophilus Hahn, who lived in Africa for fifteen years,
tells us that his father, the missionary, used to play some
hymns before the tribe of the Nama Hottentots to the ac-
companiment of a concertina. Some days afterward they
would repeat the hymns with the Dutch words, which they
could not understand. Hahn says: "They drawl the grave
songs of the hymns, such as 'O Haupt voll Blut und
Wunden,' 'Ein Lammlein geht und tragt die Schuld,'
with the same ardor as 'O du mein lieber Augustin,''
'My Heart's in the Highlands' or 'Long, Long Ago.' "

This imitative capacity of the negroes frequently spoken
of by travellers is amusingly described by Albert Frieden-
thal in his book, "Musik, Tanz und Dichtung bei den
Kreolen Amerikas." One day in October, 1898, he was
engaged in writing while sitting on his veranda at Louren^o
Marques, on the east coast of Africa. Myriads of grass-
hoppers were devasting the country, and every negro
far and near was pounding on something to drive the pests
away. The noise became unendurable, and Friedenthal
grabbed a tin plate and spoon from the hands of the first
negro he reached and cried: "If you must make a noise,
do it at least in this way!" — and he drummed out the
rhythmical motive of the Nibelungs from Wagner's te-
tralogy. He repeated the figure two or three times. "Al-
ready the negroes in my garden imitated it; then, amused
by it, those in the neighborhood took it up, and soon one

' The old German Landler, "O du lieber Augustin," is meant.

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MUSIC AMONG THE AFRICANS

could hear the Nibelung rhythm by the hour all over
Delagoa Bay."

This author makes several allusions to the innate fond-
ness of the negro for music and the influence which he has
exerted upon the art of the descendants of the Spaniards
in North and South America. On page 38 he writes:

But there is another race which has left its traces wherever it has gone —
the African negroes. As has already been remarked, they have a share in the
creation of one of the most extended forms, the Habanera. Their influence
has been strongest wherever they have been most numerously represented —
in the Antilles, on the shores of the Caribbean Sea and in Brazil. In places
where the negro has never been — in the interior of Mexico, in Argentina,
in Chili and the Cordilleran highlands — nothing of their influence is to be
observed, except that in these countries the beautiful dance of the Habanera
and numerous songs with the Habanera rhythm have effected an entrance.

On page 93 :

From a musical point of view, the influence of the African on the West
Indian Creole has been of the greatest significance, for through their coopera-
tion there arose a dance-form — the Habanera — which spread itself through
Romanic America.^ The essential thing in pure negro music, as is known, is
to be sought in rhythm. The melodic phrases of the negroes consist of endless
repetitions of short series of notes, so that we can scarcely speak of them as
TneloBies in our sense of the word. On the other hand, no European shall
eicapeThe impression which these rhythms make. They literally bore them-
selves into the consciousness of the listener, irresistible and penetrating to
the verge of torture.

On the same page again:

Whoever knows the enthusiastic love, I might almost say the fanati-
cism, of the negro for music can easily imagine the impression which the music
of the Spaniards, especially that of the Creoles, made upon them. It can
easily be proved how much they profited by the music of the Europeans, how
gradually the sense of melody was richly developed in them, and how they
acquired and made their own the whole nature of this art withoutsurrendering
their peculiarity of rhythm. This Europeanized negro music developed
to its greatest florescence in the south of the United States.

Friedenthal mentions a number of musicians who at-
tained celebrity, all of them of either pure or mixed African
descent. They are Jose White, Brindis de Salas, Albertini,
Gigueiroa and Adelelmo, violinists; Jimenez, pianist, and
Coleridge-Taylor, composer. Of Adelelmo he says that
though he was never heard outside of Brazil he was "an
eminent virtuoso and refined composer; andj to judge by
his surname (do Nascimento), probably the son of a former
slave."

Wallaschek formulates his conclusion touching African
music, after considering the testimony of travellers, as

follows:

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AFRO-AMERICAN FOLKSONGS

The general character of African music, then, is the preference for rhythm
over melody (when this is not the sole consideration); the union of song and
dance; the simplicity, not to say humbleness, of the subjects chosen; the
great imitative talent in connection with the music and the physical excite-
ment from which it arises and to which it appears appropriate.

In this characterization he might have included at least
a rudimentary knowledge of, or feeling for, harmony. There
is evidence of a harmonic sense in the American songs
themselves, though the testimony of the original collectors
does not make it clear that the slaves sang the character-
istic refrains of their songs in parts. > On this point some-
thing will have to be said presently; but the evidence of
African harmony is summarized by Wallaschek himself
in these words :

Kolbe at the beginning of the eighteenth century heard Hottentots playing
their gom-goms in harmony. "They also sang the notes of the common
chord down to the lower octave, each one beginning with the phrase whenever
the former one had already come to the second or third tone, thus producing a
harmonious effect."* Burchell describes the harmonious singing of the Bachapin
jjoys: Sometimes one of them led the band and the rest joined in at different
intervals and, guided only by the ear, attuned their voices in correct harmony.
The elder boys, whose voices were of a lower pitch, sang the bass, while the
younger produced in their turn the higher tones of the treble.* The Bechuanas
also sing in harmony. The melody of their songs is simple enough, consisting
chiefly of ascending and descending by thirds, while the singers have a sufficient
appreciation of harmony to sing in two parts.' Moodie tells us that he very
often heard the Hottentot servant girls singing in two parts; they even sang
European tuneswhich were quite new to them with the accompaniment of
a. second of their own.* The same is said by Soyauz of the negro girls of
Sierra Leone.'

Examples of harmony in the music of the Ashantees and
Fantees, from Bowditch's "Mission from Cape Coast Castle
to Ashantee," may be seen in the examples of African
music printed in this chapter (pp. 61-62), That the Daho-
mans, who are near neighbors of the people visited by Bow-
ditch, also employ harmony I can testify from observations
made in the Dahoman village at the World's Columbian
Exhibition held in Chicago in 1893. There I listened re-
peatedly during several days to the singing of a Dahoman

* Peter Kolbe, "Caput Bonae Spei Hodiernum," Nuremburg, 1719; page

iQio^iJ--,.^,""'?!'^"' '"^JfX^'' '° *^^ Interior of Southern Africa," London,
1822-'24; Vol. II, page 438.

' Ibid.

* Op. cit. II, 227.

5 Hermann Soyaux, "Aus West-Afrika," Leipsic, 1879; 11, 174.

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MUSIC AMONG THE AFRICANS

 

African Music

No.l. Drum Call from West Africa

'/'intf^ i n , i | n ii| n

No.®. "Tuning of a Zanze from South Africa

 

No. 3. Melody from the Ba-Ronga District

 


No.4. A Melody of the Hottentots

 

No.B. A Melody of the Kaffirs

 


No. 6. A War-Dance of the Dahomans

 

JiA Choriis

 


1st Chorus

Drums j i r f f p f f ' f f T f f f ■f rffff f fr f rr-«

 

Allegro

 

No.T Ashantee Air
P,

 


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AFRO-AMERICAN FOLKSONGS

 

Allegro

 

No. 8. FanteeAir

 

^1 1 n I - - I I _ I Ft J I f«, ~rr

 

No. 9. A Fantee Dirge

 

(Drums, Gosgs, etc.)

 


Specimens of African Music disclosing Elements Found in the
Songs of the Negro Slaves in America.

No. 1. A drum call from West Africa, utilized by Coleridge -Taylor in "Twenty- four Negro
Melodies transcribed for the Piano" (Boston, Oliver Ditson Co.). The specimen exhibits the
rhjrthraical "snap" or "catch", an exaggerated use of which has produced "rag-time"; also the.
fact that African drums are sometimes tuned.- No. 2. The tones given out by a zanze of
the Zulus in the posession of the author; shows the pentatonic scale with two notes strange
to the system at the end.- No. 3. A pentatonic melody from"Les Chants et les Contesdes Ba^
Ronga'/ by Henri Junod, utilized by Coleridge -Taylor, who remarked of it tbatit was "cer.
tainly not unworthy of any composer- from Beethoven downwards'.' -.No. 4. A melody of the
■Hottentots, quoted by Engel in his "Introduction to the Study of National Music". It is in
the major mode with the fourth of the scale omitted. The all-pervasive "snap" is present,a9
It is in- No. 5. A Kaffir melody, also quoted by Engel; in the major mode (D) without the
leading-tone.- No. 6. Music of a dance of the Dahomans heard at-the Columbiad ExUbifioa
in Chicago in 189S, illustrating the employment of the flat seventh and cross- rhythms be.
tween singers ami drummers.- No. 7. According to Bbwdich("Mission from Cape Coast Cas-
tle to .Ashantee',' London, 1819), the oldest air in his coUection. Bowdich says:"l could trace
it through four generations, but the answer made to my enquiries will give the best idea of its
antiquity: 'It was made when the country was made'. " It was played on the santo, a-rtade gui-
tar. It demonstrates the use of thirds.- No.S. A Fantee air from Bowdich's"Mission,6ttf.-, show-
ing thirds, fifths and the«snap'.'- No.9. A Fantee dirge for flutes and instruments of percus-
sion. Also from Bowdich, who says: "In venturing the intervening and concluding bass.chord,
I merely attempt to describe the castanets, gong.gongs, drums, etc., bursting in after tte
soft and mellow tones of the flutes; as ttthe ear wasaot to retain a vibration of theswee»
or melody ,

 

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MUSIC AMONG THE AFRICANS

 

Roiind about the Mountain

 

Moderato

 

^ Round a^bout the mountain, O round a-bout the ral-lev'Si O

 

Round a^bout the mountain,
sempre arpeggiando

 


tHv=\

 


t


fWC^ -


!-—


B H r' 1


F=


f p- 1


N^


-


4p=i

 


M

Tie


L


ord 1


ovest


' i^ r

he sin-ner, t


he

 


-1 K 1

Lord loves t


he sin-c


er,


— ti^ —

The

 


N ^ ■! ■! J


4=4=*=*=

li 1 ^ H

 

/?S i?. C. al Fine

 

Lord loves the sin- ner, and she'll rise in His arms. O

 

Lord loves the sin- ner, and she'll rise in His arms. O

(he^

 


Mildred J

this get to going in. your _ _

clip'. It seems qnite high, but is the pitch in which it was saag."

 

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AFRO-AMERICAN FOLKSONGS

minstrel who was certainly the gentlest and least assertive
person in the village, if not in the entire fair. All day long
he sat beside his little hut, a spear thrust in the ground by
his side, and sang little descending melodies in a faint high
voice, which reminded me of Dr. George Schweinfurth's
description in his "Heart of Africa" of the minstrels of
the Niam-Niam who, he said, are "as sparing of their
voices as a worn-out prima donna," and whose minstrelsy
might be said to have the "character of a lover's whisper."
To his gentle singing he strummed an unvarying accom-
paniment upon a tiny harp. This instrument, primitive
in construction (like the ancient Egyptian harps it lacked
a pole to resist the tension of the strings), was yet consider-
ably developed from an artistic point of view. It was about
two and a half feet high and had eight strings accurately
tuned according to the diatonic major system, but omitting
the fourth tone. With his right hand he played over and
over again a descending passage of dotted crochets and
quavers in thirds; with his left hand he syncopated in-
geniously on the highest two strings.

A more striking demonstration of the musical capacity
of the Dahomans was made in the war-dances which they
performed several times every forenoon and afternoon.
These dances were accompanied by choral song and the
rhythmical and harmonious beating of drums and bells, the
song being in unison. The harmony was a tonic major triad
broken up rhythmically in a most intricate and amazingly
ingenious manner. The Instruments were tuned with excel-
lent justness. The fundamental tone came from a drum
made of a hollowed log about three feet long with a single
head, played by one who seemed to be the leader of the
band, though there was no giving of signals. This drum was
beaten with the palms of the hands. A variety of smaller
drums, some with one, some with two heads, were beaten
variously with sticks and fingers. The bells, four in number,
were of iron and were held mouth upward and struck with
sticks. The players showed the most remarkable rhyth-
mical sense and skill that ever came under my notice.
Berlioz in his supremest effort with his army of drummers

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MUSIC AMONG THE AFRICANS

produced nothing to compare in artistic interest with the
harmonious drumming of these savages. The fundamental
effect was a combination of double and triple time, the
former kept by the singers, the latter by the drummers, but
it is impossible to convey the idea of the wealth of detail
achieved by the drummers by means of exchange of the
rhythms, syncopation of both simultaneously, and dynamic
devices^ Only by making a score of the music could this
have been done. I attempted to make such a score by en-
listing the help of the late John C. Fillmore, experienced
in Indian music, but we were thwarted by the players who,
evidently divining our purpose when we took out our
notebooks, mischievously changed their manner of playing
as soon as we touched pencil to paper. I was forced to
the conclusion that in their command of the element, which
in the musical art of the ancient Greeks stood higher than
either melody or harmony, the best composers of to-day
were the veriest tyros compared with these black savages.
It would be easy to fill pages with travellers' notes on
the drum-playing and dancing of the African tribes to
illustrate their marvellous command of rhythm. 1 1 content
myself with a few illustrative examples. African drums
are of many varieties, from the enormous war drums, for
which trunks of large trees provide the body and wild
beasts the membranes which are belabored with clubs,
down to the small vase-shaped instruments played with
the fingers. The Ashantees used their large drums to make
an horrific din to accompany ^human sacrifices, and large
drums, too, are used for signalling at great distances.
The most refined effects of the modern tympanist seem
to be put in the shade by the devices used by African
drummers in varying the sound of their instruments so
as to make them convey meanings, not by conventional
time-formulas but by actual imitation of words. Walla-
schek* says:

"Peculiar to Africa is the custom of using drums as a
means of communication from great distances. There
are two distinctly different kinds of this drum language,
iPage 112.

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AFRO-AMERICAN FOLKSONGS

as is shown in an example by Mr. Schauenburg. ^ He saw
at Kujar a negro beating the drum with the right hand
and varying the tone by pressing his left on the skin, so
as to imitate the sound of the Mandingo words. During
the wrestling match it sounded 'Amuta, amuta' (attack);
during the dance 'ali bae si,' and all the participants
understood it.'' . . . . Sir A. C. Moloney observed
this system of language among the Yorubas. . . and
says it is an imitation of the human voice by the drum.
To understand it one has to know 'the accents of pro-
nunciation in the vernacular and to become capable of
recognizing the different and corresponding note of the
drum.' "

The art of making the drum talk is still known in the
Antilles. In "Two Years in the French West Indies,"'
Lafcadio Hearn says:

The old African dances, the Caleinda and the Bele (which latter is accom-
panied by chanted improvization), are danced on Sundays to the sound of
the drum on almost every plantation in the land. The drum, indeed, is an
instrument to which the countryfolk are so much attached that they swear
by it, Tambou! being the oath uttered upon all ordinary occasions of surprise
or vexation. But the instrument is quite as often called ka because made out
of a quarter-barrel, or quart, in the patois ka. Both ends of the barrel
having been removed, a wet hide, well wrapped about a couple of hoops, is
driven on, and in drying the stretched skin obtains still further tension. The
other end of the ka is always left open. Across the face of the skin a string is
tightly stretched, to which are attached, at intervals of about an inch apart,
very thin fragments of bamboo or cut feather stems. These lend a certain
vibration to the tones.

In the time of Pere Labat the negro drums had a somewhat different form.
There were then two kinds of drums — a big tamtam and a little one, which
used to be played together. Both consisted of skins tightly stretched over
one end of a cylinder, or a section of a hollow tree-trunk. The larger was
from three to four feet long, with a diameter of from IS to 16 inches; the
smaller, Baboula, was of the same length, but only eight or nine inches in
diameter.

The skilful player {hel tambouye), straddles his ka stripped to the waist,
and plays upon it with the finger-tips of both hands simultaneously, taking
care that the vibrating string occupies a horizontal position. Occasionally
the heel of the naked foot is pressed lightly or vigorously against the skin
so as to produce changes of tone. This is called "giving heel" to the drum —
bailly talon. Meanwhile a boy keeps striking the drum at the uncovered
end with a stick, so as to produce a dry, clattering accompaniment. The
sound of the drum itself, well played, has a wild power that makes and masters
all the excitement of the dance — a complicated double roll, with a peculiar

» Eduard Schauenburg, "Reisen in Central-Afrika," etc. Lahr, 1859, I, 93.

' Sir Alfred Moloney, "Notes on Yoruba and the Colony and Protectorate
of Lagos," in The Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society, New Series,
XII, S96.

'Harper & Bros.; 1890.

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MUSIC AMONG THE AFRICANS

billowy rising and falling. The Creole onomatopes, b'Hp-b'lip-b'Hp-b'lip,
do not fully render the roll; for each stands really for a series of sounds too
rapidly flipped out to be_ imitated by articulate speech. The tapping of a
ka can be heard at surprising distances; and experienced players often play
for hours at a time without exhibiting wearisomeness, or in the least diminish-
ing the volume of sound produced.

It seems that there are many ways of playing — different measures familiar
to all these colored people, but not easily distinguished by anybody else; and
there are great matches sometimes between celebrated tambouye. The same
commandi whose portrait I took while playing told me that he once figured
in a contest of this kind, his rival being a drummer from the neighboring
burgh of Marigot. . . .

"Aie, ate, aie! mon che — y fat tambou-a pale!" said the commanie, describing
the execution of his antagonist; "my dear, he just made that drum talk!
I thought I was going to be beaten for sure; I was trembling all the time —
ate, yaie, yaie! Then he got off that ka. I mounted it; I thought a moment;
then I struck up the 'River-of-the-Lizard' — mats, mon che, yon lanme-Leza
toutt pi! such a 'River-of-the-Lizard,' ah! just perfectly pure! I gave heel
to that ka; — I worried that ka; I made it mad; I made it crazy; I made it
talk; I won!"

In Unyanebe, James Augustus Grant says, the large drum
is played by the leader, while a youth apparently rattled a
roll like the boy in Hearn's description. In my notebook I
find a postcard, written by Hearn from New Orleans thirty
years ago, which indicates that the manner of drumming
described by Grant and also in the above excerpt was also
common in Louisiana. Hearn writes: "The Voudoo, Congo
and Caleinda dances had for orchestra the empty wooden
box or barrel drum, the former making a dry, rapid rattle
like castanets. The man sat astride the drum." Max
Buchner^ says that the drummer in Kamerun does not beat
the time, but a continuous roll, the time being marked by
the songs of the spectators. An example of the harmonious
drumming such as I heard in the Dahoman village is men-
tioned by Hermann Wissmann in his book "Unter deut-
scher Flagge durch Afrika,"* who says that "when the chief
of the Bashilange received the European visitors he was
accompanied in his movements by a great drum with a
splendid bass tone. When he declared friendship four
well-tuned drums began to play, while the assembly sang
a melody of seven tones, repeating it several times."*

The musical instruments used in Africa do not call for
extended study or description here, since their structure

» "Kamerun," Leipsic, 1887, page 29.
' Berlin, 1889, page 72.
' Wallaschek, page llS.

I 67 1

 

AFRO-AMERICAN FOLKSONGS

has had nothing to do with influencing the forms of Afro-
American folksong. The^rum has received such extended
attention only because it plays so predominant a role in
the music of America as well as Africa^ As the rhythmical
figure which is characteristic of the Habanera (which dance
Friedenthal asserts is indubitably of African^oxigin) domin-
ates the dance-melodies of Spanish America, so -ftie "snap"
which I have found in 315 of the 527 melodies analyze.d,
in its degenerate form of "ragtime" now dominates the
careless music of two great countries — the United States
and England, y

Two instruments which would have been of incalculable
value in determining the prevalent intervallic systems of
African music, had the travellers who have described them
been musically scientific enough to tell us how they were
tuned, are the giarimba and the zanze, both of which are
found widely distributed over the Dark Continent. In these
instruments the tone-producing agency is fixed when they
are made and remains unalterable. The marimba, which
has become a national instrument in Mexico, is an instru-
ment of the xylophone type, the tones of which are struck
out of sonorous bars of wood and intensified by means
of dry calabashes of various sizes hung under the bars.
The accounts of this instrument given by travellers do not
justify an attempt to record its tunings. The zanze is
a small sound-box, sometimes reinforced by a calabash
or a block of wood hollowed out in the form of a round
gourd, to the upper side of which, over a bridge, are tightly
affixed a series of wooden or metal tongues of different
lengths. The tongues are snapped with the thumbs, the
principle involved being that of the familar music-box, and
give out a most agreeable sound. I find no recordin the
accounts of travellers as to any systematic tuning of the in-
strument, but a specimen from Zululand in my possession is
accurately tuned to the notes of the pentatonic scale, with
the addition of two erratic tones side by side in the middle
of the instrument — a fact which invites speculation.

In the table showing the results of an analysis of 527
songs, seven variations from the normal, or conventional,

[ 68 ]

 

MUSIC AMONG THE AFRICANS

diatonic major and minor scales were recorded, besides
the songs which were set down as of mixed or vague tonality.
They were (i) the major scale, with the seventh depressed
a semitone, i.e., flatted; (2) the major scale, without
the seventh or leading-tone; (3) the major scale, without
the fourth; (4) the major scale, without either seventh of
fourth (the pentatonic scale); (5) the minor scale, with
a raised or major sixth; (6) the minor scale, without the
sixth, and (7) the minor scale, with the raised seventh —
the so-called harmonic minor. Their variations or aber-
rations shall occupy our attention in the next chapter.
/For the majority of them I have found prototypes in
African music, as appears from the specimens printed in
this chapter, y

 

[ 69 ]