The Banjo and Africa

I spent this evening attending a discussion at Duke on banjos and their roots in Africa.  There are three reasons why I chose to attend:

  1. I have loved banjos ever since I realized that the melancholic and slightly creepy plucking during the Pirates of the Caribbean ride was, in fact, a banjo.
  2. Tickets were completely sold out to the “Thrown Down Your Heart” performance tomorrow night with Bela Fleck and a number of musicians from Africa.
  3. The banjo is from Africa?

Now, I love music but I can never remember artist, album, or song names so I’m fairly certain that I was the only person attending this event with absolutely no idea who Bela Fleck was.  For those of you like me, he is a renowned banjo player and seems like quite the nice guy as well.  Joining him on the panel were two of his fellow musicians, both from Tanzania, John Kitime and Anania Ngoliga.  The academic panelists included Laurent Dubois, a Duke French and history professor who has a book out on the roots of the banjo and Cece Conway, a professor at Appalachian State who got a nice round of applause so I have to assume her work is well known.  Aaron Greenwald moderated for Duke Performances.

The discussion was held in the East Duke Building and every time I attend a function at Duke, I am impressed by how gorgeous of a campus it is.  This lecture hall, the Nelson Music Room, is a musty old place that is a perfect classroom with its molded ceilings, support columns, and air vents.  Learning should happen in old, musty buildings or at least learning that finds value in intertwining history with the present.  My husband informs me that not all learning needs a historical reference; I’m not sure I believe him.

I was happy to see that the three musicians had brought their instruments with them as I was hopeful to get a taste of their music as the concert was not an option.  Aaron did say that a few tickets would be available at the door tomorrow, so if you are really interested, go and give it a shot.

The academics briefly talked about the forgotten roots of the banjo in Africa and Bela apparently spent time there to meet up with local musicians and investigate both their style and their instruments.  I learned that the banjo has been modified from West African instruments that have from 1-4 strings, including a thumb or drum string.  In America, a fifth, long string was added and only African slaves played it for about 100 years, before it became synonymous with bluegrass.  John, speaking for himself and Anania, informed us that Tanzania does not have a banjo tradition but does have a predecessor to the fiddle in their instrumental repertoire.

Every time the musicians would hint at playing, the crowd would titter with excitement.  Anania played the thumb piano, which I was happy to finally have a name for after seeing it in several world culture types of stores.  It sounds a lot like a xylophone, which was surprising as it consisted of a bunch of little medal strands fixed to a hollow wooden box.  I obviously don’t know much about musical instruments.

I was most charmed when Bela admitted that he had gone on an African tour to do research on the banjo but, “…really, I just wanted play with some cool musicians.”  From that desire came three products:  this tour, an album, and a film all of the same name, “Thrown Down Your Heart.”

Next, we learned that this collaboration with Bela was the first time John and Anania had really played with people outside of their country, though they are obviously fantastic musicians.  John made the point that even in Tanzania, there are well over a hundred different tribes, all with their own music and traditions so combining styles is not as easy as it may seem.  Anania then sang for us the Swahili version of “Oh, Susannah” that he had learned.  American folk songs came over with the Peace Corp in the 60s, though the lyrics were completely different and only the melody preserved.

The floor was opened for questions and we discussed whether it is condescending to refer to African music as world music.  Bela made a point that he, when going anywhere overseas, is considered to be a world musician so it may be more a means of reference to those outside of one’s own culture, no matter where that may be.  Another audience member asked if the drum string was used for melody more often in Africa than here and Bela said yes, definitely but that it has been used that way here as well and Cece threw out a name or two that I didn’t catch.

We had the luxury of listening to at least three different songs during the discussion and were very grateful.  The last was a trio of thumb piano, banjo, and guitar used as a percussion instrument.  I left the discussion knowing one thing for sure, “Throw Down Your Heart” will be on my list the next time I hit a music store.

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