Composing the Music of Africa

by Floyd, Malcolm

• ISBN13: 9781859281437
• ISBN10: 1859281435
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1999-12-01
• Publisher: Scolar Pr

Summary

This book brings together scholars and composers from many parts of Africa and beyond to investigate the range of processes involved in the creation of African music.It looks at the way specialists put together music for their instruments or voices. The ways in which communities may be involved in composition are also examined, and there are discussions of traditional music and its composition from particular parts of North, South, East and West Africa.Contemporary composers talk about their involvement with African music as part of their material or as their inspiration, including methods of incorporation and assimilation, and their effectiveness.This is a book for all those interested in the great range and variety of composition in an immensely diverse continent.

Table of Contents

List of Figures	ix
Notes on Contributors	xiii
Introduction: Composing the Music of Africa	1	(6)
Malcolm Floyd
Melodic and Rhythmic Aspects of African Music	7	(14)
Christopher James
Part I: The Making of `Traditional' Musics
Egypt
Egyptian Folk Music	21	(8)
Adel Kamel
Ghana
The Roots of Ghanaian Composers	29	(16)
James Flolu
Drumming in Ghana	45	(22)
Trevor Wiggins
The Xylophone Tradition of North-West Ghana	67	(24)
Trevor Wiggins
Uganda
The Making of Karimojong' Cattle Songs	91	(16)
Kenneth Gourlay
Embaire Xylophone Music of Samusiri Babalanda	107	(28)
Gerhard Kubik
Kenya
Warrior Composers: Maasai Boys and Men	135	(30)
Malcolm Floyd
New Lyres in Northern Kenya: the Enchamunge of the Samburu and the Kilumba of the Turkana	165	(30)
Malcolm Floyd
Part II: The Changing Faces of Music
Consumer-led Creation: Taarab Music Composition in Zanzibar	195	(32)
Janet Topp Fargion
Kwela: the Structure and Sound of Pennywhistle Music	227	(38)
Lara Allen
Keeping our Ears to the Ground: Cross-Culturalism and the Composer in South Africa, `Old' and `New'	265	(26)
Hans Roosenschoon
Timbila	291	(4)
Hans Roosenschoon
Black - White - Rainbow: a Personal View on what African Music means to the Contemporary Western Composer	295	(40)
Geoffrey Poole
Egyptian Composition in the Twentieth Century	335	(18)
Adel Kamel
Index	353