African Tones

African Tone-Systems: A ReassessmentAuthor(s): Gerhard KubikSource: Yearbook for Traditional Music, Vol. 17 (1985), pp. 31-63Published by: International Council for Traditional MusicStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/768436Accessed: 01/12/2008 00:34

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AFRICAN TONE-SYSTEMS-A REASSESSMENT

by Gerhard Kubik

There is an extensive literature on "African scales", but only rarely is it reported what the internal order of the tone material is in the minds of the musicians themselves. Only in a few works can one find direct quotations from the musicians in their own vocabulary. One famous example is Klaus Wachsmann's documentation of the tuning process of an amadinda xylophone in Uganda, and the critical remarks made in Luganda by the two royal musicians, Mr. Evaristo Muyinda and Mr. Baziwe, while they were tuning their instruments. Simultaneously, the process of tuning was measured "live" with a Stroboconn pitch- measuring machine. Wachsmann writes (1957:14-15): "Strictly speaking there is no scale which one could describe in unambiguous terms of physical definition, but there are tuning processes in the course of which corrections are made. Their trend can be described, and in favourable circumstances one can form a realistic picture of the pattern in the mind of the tuner."

Atta Annan Mensah has described the tuning procedure of a silimba xylophone of the Lozi of western Zambia. Mensah comes from Ghana and in his musical understanding was formed a great deal by Western "serious" music. He observed Kanjele and Sililo, two Lozi xylophone makers at length during the making and tuning of new instruments at the Maramba Cultural Centre (formerly the Open Air Museum) in Living- stone, which is a well-known tourist attraction in Zambia. He came to the conclusion that "The basic factor guiding Kanjele and Sililo seemed to be their reliance on regional pitch- a virtue by which we experience a note, not as an individuality, but as a member of a group, occupying some place in a tone-region where it belongs. This virtue provides no absolute guarantee for obtaining pitch accuracy, but its usefulness as a general guide cannot be over-stressed. Kanjele's and Sililo's basis of final judgement, as suggested by their constant reference to other notes, was the relativity of a note to other members of the keyboard" (Mensah 1970:22).

Another contribution to the study of tunings is the book by the Cameroonian ethnologist and musician Pie-Claude Ngumu on the mendzao portable gourd-resonated xylophones played in Yaounde. (Ngumu 1976: also his article 1975/76 in African Music which amplifies his findings). Ngumu reports at length how the xylophones were tuned by his main informant Ambasa. "Dans sa technique de fabrication, Ambasa commence par fixer empiriquement le son d'une lame omvak. La position de cette lame est double. Elle est initiale quant a sa fabrication. Mais quant a sa place, elle est centrale ...."

"Je pense que cela trouve sa justification dans la tradition beti. Le chef de famille, en tant que responsable de la vie de tous ceux qui se reclament

32 / 1985 YEARBOOK FOR TRADITIONAL MUSIC

de lui, se place toujours au milieu des siens, dans les reunions tradi- tionelles. Aussi les musicians ont-ils trouve bon de faire pareil pour souligner l'importance de la premiere lame de bois des mendzan. Ils ont donne une position centrale a cette lame initiale. Tous les sons tirent leur origine d'elle .... Dorenavant, je la designe par le chiffre 1." (Ngumu 1975/76:14).

Omvak is the name of one of the four xylophones which play together in a group. The pronunciation varies in the local languages of southern Cameroon. As is the case in numerous other musical cultures of Africa the tuning of the mendzan reflects the idea of a hierarchical order of tones corresponding with a social pattern. This is evident from Ngumu's account. Something similar has been reported by another Cameroonian, the musician and theatre expert Jean-Baptiste Obama from Yaounde. In an unpublished manuscript which he distributed among us at the UNESCO conference on African Music in Yaounde, 23-27 February 1970, he wrote about a "polygamous" mvet. Mvet is the designation for the Cameroonian stick zither (compare Kubik in: The New Grove, 1980) and also the ngombi from the Peoples' Republic of Congo which I have described, elsewhere, (cf. Simon (Ed.) 1983:91). Obama writes: "-d'autant plus qu'il existe ci une classification africaine, certes embryonnaire, mais curieusement 'socialisante' au point d'organiser les notes, non en gammes classiques, mais en systeme 'familial' (grand Parents, Mere, Fils, petit-fils etc.) parfois de type polygamique dans le Mvet (lere epouse, 2? epouse, 3? etc.). Ceci prouve que la Musique est autre chose en Afrique traditionelle qu'une simple affaire d'esthetique: c'est la Philosophie ethique des Peuples Africains .. ."

Among the Mpyem%, who are settled in the south-western corner of the Central African Republic, the notes of a xylophone are also concep- tualized as the members of a family. Maurice Djenda surprised me once on a joint field trip in his home area when he represented tones by means of hand positions. First he held the palm of his right hand just above the ground and explained that this represented the size of the note, which he then struck on the kembe (lamellophone); it was a high note. Then he moved his open hand gradually upwards, away from the ground, striking at the same time lower and lower notes with the thumb of his other hand. He said, "One can represent the size of children with the same hand positions." The hand positions, as they moved upwards meant the increasing size of the children as they become older. In the present case it referred to the notes of the kembe. The concept of high frequency tones as small and low frequencies as big is widespread in Africa and was first observed by Hugh Tracey. It is reflected in the musical terminology of numerous African languages.

Returning to Pie-Claude Ngumu's account of the mendzan we learn that the tuning of a 10-note instrument (omvak) proceeds as follows: (Ngumu 1976). After the central note was established which Ngumu calls No. 1 and which represents the "chef de famille" (head of the family) his informant Ambasa continued by moving stepwise downwards: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. With Key No. 6 he reached the lowest note of the instrument. After

AFRICAN TONE SYSTEMS / 33

these six notes he found the upper octaves of the three lowest ones: 6, 5 and 4, which represent the wives of the three male voices of keys No. 6, 5 and 4. Finally there remained one note to be tuned: No. 7 whose position was between No. 1 and No. 6. Here Ngumu reports something very interesting: "Apres le reglage des sons des neuf lames de bois que nous venons de designer, Ambasa ne cacha pas son embarras pour fixer le son de la derniere lame. Le xylophone qu'il avait connu et pratique dans son enfance ne comportait que les neuf lames que nous venons de voir, pour la construction du premier instrument. Mais par la suite il avait constate, surtout lors de son sejour an pays Etenga, que quelques groupes de mendzaU avaient introduit un nouveau son entre la lame 1 et la lame 6. On appelait cette nouvelle lame Esandi."

"Le mot esandi, en Ewondo, vient du mot asanda qui signifie "malchance". Le changement du "a" initial en "e", et du "a" final en "i", a cree un nouveau mot qui designe l'action de jeter la malchance et le trouble. C'est le mot esandi. Un objet aui porte ce mot comme terme de designation est considere comme trouble-fete. Cette lame de bois de mendzar qu'on appelle esandi est donc consideree, par ceux qui l'ont introduite, comme une intervention purement etrangere au systeme, interposant un son inaccoutume aux mendzat beti traditionnels. Sur le degre de sa hauteur, il ne reproduit aucun autre son de toutes les lames de bois des mendzar. On peut seulement constater que l'esandi produit un son plus haut que 1, et plus bas que 6. D'autre part, il est le dernier venu. Je le designe par le chiffre 7." (Ngumu 1976:37).

In his notation system Ngumu uses numbers, numbering the keys of the four xylophones (from the viewpoint of the player holding his instrument) according to the internal order of the tuning pattern as conceived by his informant Ambasa. Though the layout of the notes is regular and stepwise, the pattern is conceived as beginning in the middle of the keyboard with the note marked No. 1. The notes of the 10-key instrument called omvak are numbered by Ngumu from left to right in descending order of sound as in the following illustration (Fig. 1 reproduced from Ngumu 1976:38).

Ngumu's minute observation and description of the tuning process makes the order behind this system clearly visible. Ambasa did not use any external pitch references such as a tuning fork or an old xylophone for tuning the new one. A tuning pattern was imprinted on his memory. We may characterize this by the following traits: 1) It has a starting point, i.e., what Ngumu has called note No. 1. This tone stands for the head of an extended family or clan. No. 1 occupies a central position in the hierarchy, from which all the other members radiate. 2) From this central tone there is a line of six tones going down in steps. The size of these steps is imprinted on Ambasa's memory by musical enculturation. 3) After reaching the end of this tone-row, he proceeds by finding partners for each of the three biggest notes. The partners are small (high- pitched) notes, considered to be female voices, the "wives". In finding the "wives" he proceeds up the keyboard-in contrast to his earlier

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Fig. 1

downward procedure- finding the "octaves" from 6 to 6, 5 to 5 and 4 to 4.

With this ends the process of tuning the xylophone to a basically hexatonic pattern. But there is an appendix. Some time ago a 7th note intruded into the xylophone music of southern Cameroon. Where it comes from is not known. Did it come from German mission and school songs before 1916? Did it come from Western musical instruments such as mouth-organs which were very popular among youngsters during the German era in Cameroon?1

The seventh note is still considered an intruder, alien to the system and therefore referred to as a "spoil-sport" (esandi). With it Ambasa fills the "gap" in the hexatonic tuning pattern of his omvak. In his article in African music, written later than the book, though the publication date is earlier, Pie-Claude Ngumu confirms that the esandi is not a tone with a long tradition in southern Cameroon. He bases this on an account by Georg Zenker, who became the German administrator of the post of Yaounde when it was founded in 1889, in the same year (Zenker 1895). Zenker described two types of xylophones found in the area, the rail xylophone (with gourd resonators) and the log xylophone (with a banana stem base). He said that the 7th degree was often "missing" in the tunings.

What are the components of Ambasa's inner tuning pattern? Are there fixed intervals? What is actually going on in his mind when he tunes the


six descending notes, beginning with the "chef de famille"? Ngumu writes: "Jusqu'a present, je reste persuade que, chez les Beti, il n'y a pas de commune mesure pour le reglage des 7 tons de mendzai. Je pense que chaque groupe ethnique regle les sons des instruments en fonction de la musique du coin, musique traditionnelle et musique plus recente des musiciens actuels, musique dont les inflexions particulieres ne sont pas necessairement identiques partout." (Ngumu 1976:65).

The tuning measurements of several xylophones and stick-zithers from southern Cameroon which I recorded in 1964 also show considerable variation, even when comparing apparently identical tunings with each other. However, the Cents figures tend to come close to an equiheptatonic division of the octave. Where six notes are found, these tunings give the impression of "gapped scales", if I may use A. M. Jones' term. In an appendix to the second edition of his book Africa and Indonesia (1971:240-242), and notes on pages 253-354) Jones published the measurements of my tunings No. 6, 9, 10 and 15 from Cameroon. He has also commented on Ngumu's book in a short review article (Jones 1978).

The intervals struck simultaneously in the xylophone music of southern Cameroon are mainly thirds and octaves. When one pays attention to the Cents figures not only for the intervals between neighbouring steps, but also for those of the thirds-which result on the mendzarj from skipping one step-it becomes clear that most of the thirds are indeed 'neutral', i.e. those that conform with an equiheptatonic tuning or about 343 Cents. There is no evidence that Ngumu's informant Ambasa or any of my own informants in southern Cameroon in 1964, 1966 or 1969/70 conceived their tuning patterns as consisting of intervals of changing size, as is the case with the Western seven-note diatonic scale. It is certain that Ambasa and others did indeed have one standard interval size in mind, transferring it from step to step.

On the basis of all the information on the Cameroonian mendzaj gathered so far, we may now tentatively delineate the Beti/Ewondo xylophone tuning system and define it as (a) a pattern proceeding by step, (b) proceeding from a central tone in the middle of the keyboard, (c) with a standard interval size of ca. 160-180 cents, (d) with octave duplication of certain notes, (e) with a traditional "gap" between tones 1 and 6. For sounding together, the performers within this system use parallel octaves-in which case the voice of the "men" and "women" notes sound together- and parallel (neutral) thirds, as euphonic voice duplications. In the importance of the latter interval may even be hidden the historical clue to how the Beti and many other peoples in Central and West Africa arrived at a near equi-heptatonic tone-system. The desire to transpose the consonant interval of a third in parallel movement over the keyboard of a xylophone (or in vocal music through the range of combining voices) demands adjustments, if this process is to take place within a seven-note scale. The neutral thirds, fluctuating between 320 and 370 Cents represent one effective compromise solution.2

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"Descending" and "ascending" scales Ngumu's analysis relies predominantly on sympathetic observation of

his informant's behaviour and statements. It is possible to arrive at valuable conclusions about what is intraculturally significant in the organization of acoustic phenomena- especially with regard to tuning patterns- from intensive observation of the musicians' actions. To demonstrate this, I should now like to offer some observations from Uganda, the Central African Republic and the Sudan.

In Busoga, southern Uganda, it is customary to lay out the notes of an embaire log xylophone on its banana stems only shortly before a performance. At the end of each performance the instrument is taken apart, and the xylophone keys and the banana stems are kept in a shady place, usually inside a house. This is to prevent the banana stems, whose humidity is important foi the mellow sound of the instrument, from drying out quickly in the excessive heat, and also the keys from getting out of tune. However, in order to be able to reassemble the 15 notes of the embaire quickly in the correct order, the keys were numbered in one case I observed. (See photo in Kubik 1982:83). The purpose was to avoid having to tap each note to find its proper place in the scale-a time-consuming and tiresome process, especially when dancers and onlookers are already waiting impatiently for the music to start.

In the case of the embaire ensemble of Venekenti Nakyebale which I documented at Bumanya (Busoga) on January 2, 1963, the notes were numbered in descending order from 1-15 in the manner of a scale. The smallest (highest) xylophone note had the number 1. (Kubik 1964a; and recordings No. B 7117-7120, Ph.A. Vienna).

In 1964 I came upon a further case of numbering the slats of xylophone, this time in the Central African Republic among the Azande. A kponingbo- which is one of the two types of log xylophones found among the Azande of the C.A.R. (Kubik 1967a:44-45)-had the notes numbered. I saw this instrument in Zemio and it had 12 notes. Here too, the numerical order was in the form of a scale, from the highest to the lowest key.

Eventually I came upon a third case in Khartoum in February 1975 during a lecture tour. The Director of the National Innovation Centre for Popular Creativity, Dr. Amin Mohamed Ahmed, introduced me to two expert Azande musicians from the south. They were employed by the music school of Khartoum, strangely enough not as teachers of African music, but as house keepers. As it turned out, the two musicians played kundi most excellently. In this case the designation did not refer to the harp (cf. Kubik 1964b), but to the box-resonated lamellophone called likembe in Zaire. And they were even more expert on a 14-key kpaningbo log xylophone (local pronunciation).

I invited them to give a demonstration during one of my lectures at the Department of Culture, Ministry of Culture and Information, Khartoum. They came with their carefully constructed and tuned instrument and played it, sitting opposite each other, with great expertise. The 14 keys were numbered from 1-14 in descending order of


pitch, characteristically with Latin (and not Arabic) numerals. In fact the typical English 1 and 7 were used.

Unfortunately I was only able to communicate with these musicians through an Arabic and English speaking interpreter. Asked for the reason for numbering the slats, it seems they replied that it was for quickly assembling the loose-keyed instrument.

In January 1977, when I visited Khartoum again, I was amazed to find that one of the musicians, Mr. Saimon Bazawi, ca. 26, had in the meantime been promoted and integrated into the National dance troupe of the Sudan. His kpaningbo had been acquired by the Department of Culture. It was still in excellent shape and I was able, on this occasion to take a photograph.

In none of the three cases examined was it explicitly stated by the musicians why the numerical order went from "smallest" (highest) to "biggest" (lowest) and not the other way. Although the numbering had a practical purpose, the descending order and even the fact that there was a numbering order at all, cannot be explained as a consequence of the practical purpose alone. In Maurice Djenda's home village in the south- west of the Central African Republic, children once made a small log xylophone for us whose notes were identified with ideographic symbols and not with numbers. These symbols did not have a scalar order. (Field- notes 1966, G. Kubik).

The numbering system cannot be there by chance either. I think therefore that it is legitimate to assume that it must reflect a principle of order in the tonal world as conceived by the musicians, regardless of the fact that this notation is a "modern" one which could only have existed in Uganda, southern Sudan and Central African Republic since the introduction of Western-type school education; hence the use of Latin and not Arabic numerals by the Azande musicians of Khartoum.

How can it be shown that this descending order is motivated by musical, not extra-musical ideas? Can it be that other (non-musical) associations play a role, such as for example, "people walking in single file" with the small ones first, as was suggested to me by a participant in a seminar I held (on the invitation of Professor John Blacking) at Queen's University, Belfast, in April 1975? Do the small ones come first in the society of the Azande and the Basoga?

That the numbers refer to pitch is obvious, because what the musicians want to avoid is wasting time while reassembling the instrument. Also, the numbers cannot refer to the physical size of the slats, because this is often irregular and does not necessarily go in step with the series of pitches.

I have no doubt for myself that the numbering really reflects ideas about tonal order. Although there are significant differences between the tone systems of the Basoga and the Azande-the Kisoga system being approximately equi-pentatonic (see Wachsmann 1967) while the Azande have intervals of different size in their pentatonic scale- there are also significant common traits: 1. The tonal material is ordered in both cases

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as a pattern proceeding by step. 2. The tuning procedure starts with the highest pitch and ends with the lowest.

Among the Azande these concepts are expressed in the structure of the verbal mnemonic patterns used for tuning various instruments. Samuel Ouzana, the little Zande harp player, who was one of my informants in 1964 in the Central African Republic, used to tune his harp while singing a tuning formula and simultaneously sounding the five strings to each syllable.

Verbal tuning pattern for the five-string harp (kundi) used by Samuel Ouzana, Zemio, Central African Republic, in May 1964:

* 0 * * _* _ _ v 5

'ili oai sa su-nge. Mu ;a ku-ndi ki bi bya-le-u ki-ndi. Ku-luo pai sa su-nge.

Note: The five lines represent the strings of the harp and not the stave of the Western staff notation.

Fig. 2

With the first section of the mnemonic pattern Ouzana tuned the strings by step from the highest to the lowest notes of the pentatonic Zande scale. With the second section he checked the expected harmonic sounds. As in many other areas of Africa these are obtained by skipping one note of the scale. Here, the harpist did not strike them simultaneously, but played them split up melodically in a sequence. (See the middle part of the figure above). With the last section Ouzana reconfirmed the scale pattern. In Zande harp music characteristic chordal patterns are used as is evident, for example in Samuel Ouzana's harp song: "Gbaduleo" (see Kubik 1964b:69).

Similar tuning mnemonies are found in one or another variant throughout Zande country, extending across contemporary borders into Zaire and the southern Sudan. They are reliable hints at how people in a musical culture arrange their tonal material.

Wachsmann's investigation of the tuning processes of harp and xylophone among the Baganda, to whom the neighbouring Basoga are related, have also shown a movement from high to low notes. (Wachsmann 1950, 1957). These results do not exclude the possible presence of extra-musical relationships which may also be motivating factors.

In the southern and south-eastern parts of Africa scale patterns are often conceived in the reverse order, from the "biggest" to the "smallest" tone. This is the case, for instance, among the Lozi of western Zambia as is apparent from the process of making and tuning a silimba xylophone, (see Mensah 1970), among the Mbwela, Luchazi, Luvale, Chokwe, and related groups in Angola, and among the Tswa of Mozambique. A Tswa group which I heard at a "mine dance" to which Hugh and Andrew Tracey took me in January 1966 had the keys of their xylophones numbered from low to high notes. The Chopi of Mozambique, as we


have learned from Hugh Tracey's testimony, also tune their xylophones from the chief note hombe in an ascending scale. (H. Tracey 1948). Chordal tuning patterns

During our West African tour of 1973 Donald Kachamba from Malawi was once asked by the Ghanaian musicologist Ben Aning, Legon, what concept he followed in tuning his guitar. Donald said: "I am thinking like playing. I hear the tune". By "tune" Donald meant "tuning" as he explained to me later.

Donald has said to me that he actually "hears" the tuning internally, as if he was playing, and from this he tunes his guitar. By physical actions such as turning the pegs, placing the fingers on the fretboard, striking the strings, etc. he gradually brings the notes of the guitar into congruence with his inner tuning model. (Note, diary, February 2, 1973).

Donald's music figures among the musical developments in south- central Africa during the 1960s and 1970s. In their concepts and their teaching and learning methods these musics are very close to the so- called traditional music of the region, although Western musical instruments are used.3

I observed many times with Donald that he does not tune his guitar to the open strings, following the pattern (from low to high) E - A - D - g - b - e, but that he begins with chords, fingers on. He fingers a tonic major chord. Which kind of fingering he actually uses depends on the kind of tuning he wants, because, like other guitarists of the region, he uses several different tunings. Often he plays five-string guitar with the fifth string removed.

On March 22, 1974 during his second stay in Vienna I watched him attentively while he was tuning his six-string guitar to fulusi (Full C). Here the basic tuning of the strings corresponds with the western tuning pattern, with the exception of the 6th string which is tuned a semitone higher. Without the capotasta it sounds F instead of E.

In this tuning he proceeds as follows: First he fingered string No. 2 at fret 1 and tuned the major third c-e between string Nos. 2 and 1. As soon as he had got this interval, he struck the open 3rd string, tuning it to g, to form the 2nd inversion triad (g-c-e) between string Nos. 3, 2 and 1. I have long come to the conclusion that this chord is something like the nucleus and point of departure of his harmonic ideas. It also plays an important role in the multi-part organization of his music. (See Kubik 1974:20-23).

Then he gradually tunes downwards to the 4th, 5th and 6th strings while fingering the full C major chord (see Fig. 3). As soon as the chord sounded right to him, he played a descending melodic phrase, which reminded me of a tuning formula. Finally he checked the success of his tuning process by trying further chords and musical fragments.

In Vienna on April 6 Donald again played solo guitar in fulusi tuning. Now I asked him to record it for me on a tape and "measure" it by comparison with the 54 tuning forks (from 212 to 424 c.p.s.) which have been recommended by Hugh Tracey for field work. (H. Tracey 1958b

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also under Notes and News, pp. 77-78). Donald knew the procedure already, because he had used the forks the same year to measure the c.p.s. of many instrumental tunings from Malawi himself during our joint evaluation of the recorded and filmed material of 1967.

First Donald tuned his guitar. He attached the capotasta at the 4th fret. Then he recorded his finished tuning on a NAGRA 4.2 L, at 19 cm/sec., after sounding a reference tone with a 440 c.p.s. tuning fork. His behaviour during the recording was characteristic: (1) he fingered his C major chord and (2) he sounded each string with fingers on from the highest to the lowest note consecutively several times. This was in the same order as he had tuned them.

Then he fetched the small case with the 54 tuning forks. He compared his recorded guitar notes with those of the appropriate forks and wrote down in a note-book the c.p.s. number written on the fork, as soon as he had identified the right one. Since the set, which was specially made by Ragg Tuning Forks Ltd., Sheffield, comprises only one octave, unisons and octaves are not distinguished in Donald's evaluation. This was irrelevant, however, for my subsequent calculation of the Cents intervals.

He also recorded a second tuning: Kiji (Key G). This tuning corresponds with that of the Western guitar, the 6th string now tuned (relatively) to E. In Donald's case the capotasta was on the 4th fret. While recording this tuning he positioned his fingers as if playing a G major tonic chord. This is also exactly the basic fingering position used by Mwenda Jean Bosco (Mwenda wa Bayeke) in his "Tambala moja" (For greater detail on Bosco's music see David Rycroft 1961 and 1962; and John Low 1983). FULUSI Fingering: KIJI Fingering:

Th.


Major triads are the basis of consonant chordal chains in the multi- part organization of music in several regions of Africa. Some of the most impressive examples may be heard in the music of the Bongili and Bakota in the north of the Peoples' Republic of Congo. (Recordings B 8750-8752 in the Ph.A. Vienna). They are also found in Mpyem3 music of the Central African Republic. (See Kubik 1967a:47, and recordings Ph.A. B 8740 and 8745). Parallel singing in major thirds is a prominent feature of Sya stories, and here this is combined with semitone progressions. Sya stories constitute an important cultural heritage among the Mpycm5 which they brought with them on their migration from the south (Congo) to their present settling area. (On the migration of the Mpycm5 see map in Djenda 1966/67:40).

The appreciation of such chordal patterns often derives from the experience of musical bow harmonies, although not always and not necessarily so. Practice of other musical instruments and even certain vocal techniques alone may also have led in the past to the discovery and selective use of natural harmonies. The latter is probably the case with the Wagogo of Central Tanzania (resp. their predecessors) who do not use musical bows. Philip Donner, Helsinki, possesses a crucial recording of a Gogo mouth-resonated vocal technique, which instantly generates the harmonics-based Gogo tone-system I first described in 1967 and 1968 (see also below).

In societies where musical bows are used, the experience gathered from the use of variable resonators is usually a determinant that largely predestines a musical culture. If a mouth-bow is tuned to two fundamentals, either a whole-tone or a semi-tone apart, as is the case in many cultures of the Congo, Gabon and Central African Republic, the result is a blow-derived harmony based on two tonal centres. (See my discussion of the bet mouth-bow of the Fang' and its polyphony, in Kubik 1968).

If the harmonic series from the 3rd to the 5th partial is used the result is the characteristic 2nd inversion triad we have mentioned. Major chords in this inversion in fact play a great role in several kinds of multi-part music especially of central and southern Africa. On top of the alternating fundamentals the low voices (of the men) sing at the level of the 3rd partial, the middle voices at the level of the 4th and the high voices (women and children) at the level of the 5th. The consequence is hexatonic parallel movement, with predominantly step-moving melody in which the parallel thirds occur characteristically in the treble and the parallel fourths below. Though this pattern may be obscured by the simultaneous presence of equidistant ideas of tone relations, it can clearly be recognized in several multi-part forms in Angola and Zambia. In what seems to be a heptatonic extension it is also present in the multi- part concepts of the music of the Kachamba Brothers of Malawi, in whose style the following chordal progressions have become established practice (Kubik 1974:21). I have been able to discuss these chords with Daniel Kachamba on many occasions. Although he does not write them down, he has a clear theoretical concept about how each voice should go.

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Chordal sequence in Kachamba's multi-part singing style

Vocal parts: 2 bo o 8 ~, " ^-^=- Guitar chords: [C7 F(6) C G7] [C7 F(6) C G7]

This harmonic pattern was introduced to Malawi in the 1950s and 1960s with South-African kwela and later, simanje-manje music. The accompanying guitar chords form a harmonic cycle which has roots in South African musical styles. It is a re-interpretation and adaptation for the guitar of a traditional harmonic cycle. The Kachamba Brothers do have knowledge of musical bows, and Lidiya Malamusi, a member of the group performs on the nkangala (mouth-bow). But there is no connec- tion between the nkangala (usually pentatonic) bow harmonies and the heptatonic multi-part style described above. The latter was adopted from South African simanje-manje and its origin may be multi-lateral. Its structural characteristics point to areas in southern Africa where progressions between four "chords" or harmonic segments have been present in some of the older traditions.

There are several tone-systems in Africa based on the recognition and selective arrangement of harmonics. However, two fundamentally different procedures have to be distinguished: Is the tonal material derived from one or two fundamentals? So far, it seems that African tone-systems based on partials over a single fundamental, are not usually derived from musical bow harmonies, while those over two fundamentals usually are. A case for the first is the tone system of the Wagogo and Wakisi (old style) of Tanzania, the Ashirima of Mocambique and some other East African peoples. A case for the second is the tetratonic system of the !Kung' (Khoisan) people of southern Angola and Namibia, and the hexatonic system of several Bantu-language peoples of Central Africa, such as the Fang' (Gabon), the -Nkhumbi and -Handa of south- western Angola and others. The -Nkhumbi and -Handa have several types of musical bows (cf. Kubik 1975/76).

The next distinguishing feature is how high up the series of partials is used, i.e. what section of the natural harmonic series is selected to form the tone-system. Depending on these two variables completely different tonal-harmonic systems may be encountered among those African peoples whose music is partly or entirely preconditioned by recognition and use of harmonics. This can best be shown by a comparison of the tonal-harmonic resources of a few well-known peoples in Africa. In the following summary I am drawing extensively on my earlier research whose results were discussed in detail in various contexts.


A) Tone-systems based on the use of harmonics of a single fundamental Example 1: The tone-system of the Wagogo (Central Tanzania)

(-)

partials - No. 4 5 6 7 8 9 , Cents 0 386 702 969 0 204 *

Tonal melodic material of Resulting -Gogo harmonies -Gogo music (obtained by a skipping process, i.e.

always skipping one note in the scale)

The -Gogo tone-system is basically tetratonic (within one octave) with

a pentatonic extension. It is based on selective use of the sequence of natural harmonics from partials 4 to 9, over a single fundamental. (Recordings: Exp. Kubik 11/1962, Phonogrammarchiv Vienna B 7253-7266. For a theoretical discussion and tuning measurements, see Kubik 1967b; and 1968:31-38).

Example 2: The old tone-system of the Wakisi (Lake Malawi area, Tanzania)

partials Nos. 6 7 8 9 10 11 +A Cents 702 969 0 204 386 551

Tonal-melodic material of Resulting -Kisi harmonies old -Kisi music

The old -Kisi tone-systems (now obsolete) was hexatonic. It was based on the selective exploitation of the sequence of natural harmonies from partials 6-11 over a single fundamental. The resulting tonal-harmonic system may easily be mistaken for a "gapped equiheptatonic" scale, if conclusions are based on Stroboconn measurements alone, without considering tone-system and harmonic system simultaneously. (Record- ings: Exp. Kubik I and 11/1960, 1962, Ph. A. Vienna, B 4851, B 7321-7324).

B) Tone-systems based on the use of harmonics of two fundamentals These tone-systems are frequently encountered in areas where the

musical bow, particularly the mouth-bow in its varieties, is or was an important instrument. West-Central Africa and the whole of southern Africa are the most prominent distribution areas for mouth bows, but also some spots in West Africa. (For the distribution of musical bows in southern Africa see: Camp and Nettl 1955, Rycroft 1981).

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(Recordings Kubik Exp. IV, 1965, Ph. A. B 10663-10671, B 10507-10515). From the comparison of my sample of !Kung' bow music recordings in Angola (Kubik 1970:62-62) and the measurements of the fundamentals (see Kubik, in press) it became apparent that the three bow tunings are also related in their absolute pitches with each other. From this arises the theoretical possibility of simultaneous application leading to an "anchorage" between the three, a kind of merger which is hexatonic. (See my discussion elsewhere, in press). The basic tuning of all the three !Kung' tunings, and perhaps the historically oldest seems to be the one at an interval of approximately 400 Cents. The melodic and harmonic results are so characteristic that they may be considered as diagnostic of a Khoisan heritage in any music of southern Africa where they occur.

Theory of tuning patterns One can conceptualize the process of tuning a musical instrument as a

kind of "focussing". An inner tuning model once learned and gradually internalized by the carrier of a tradition- and which may be either relative or absolute in its pitches- is projected on the "chaotic stimuli" emerging from an untuned instrument. The manipulations of the musician who is attempting to tune his instrument gradually bring these orderless tones into congruence with the internal tuning pattern. Now the instrument is tuned correctly. The methods employed by the musician for checking the tuning often reveal the nature of his inner tuning model.

According to the evidence available so far, inner tuning models are transmitted culturally at an early age, depending on the musical environment in which the child grows up i.e., to what kind of tone-system it is exposed through daily experience in his culture or sub-culture. In some parts of the world physical-acoustic factors, such as vibration ratios, harmonics, etc. played an important role in the evolution of a culture- specific order of acoustic phenomena. "Deep listening" into the sound spectrum (timbre) of various sounding objects and/or the experience of the sound spectrum of the human voice must have triggered the rise of such systems. Certain sectors of the acoustic world became attractive to humans depending on the environment in which they lived and how they had learned to shape it.

Other musical systems are based on different forms of order, resulting from a different set of experiences. Only the 2:1 ratio (octave) seems to be universally recognized and known even in musical cultures whose tuning systems show no regular ratios at all. Many tone systems, in fact, are determined by a combination of formative factors resulting from more than one dimension of human experience.

In several African cultures, for instance, tone systems are influenced and even preformed by patterns in the tonal languages. In some other cultures a principle of proceeding through a span of notes by identical steps became attractive. It may occur in combination with consonantal ideas and compromise solutions may be the result. Usually this span is

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the "octave", but it can also be another interval. Although the language background may simultaneously play an important role in such musical cultures, if it is the octave, it is usually divided into either five or seven identical (equidistant) steps. In which direction it is, i.e., from high to low frequencies or the reverse (or from the "smallest" to the "biggest" or "fattest" tone as it is expressed in many African languages) may again depend on various factors. An idea about how widespread the principle of equidistance is in Africa may be gathered from the studies of individual societies by A.M. Jones 1964, Kubik 1982, Kyagambiddwa 1955, Rouget 1969, Hugh Tracey 1958a, Wachsmann 1950, 1957, 1967, Wim van Zanten 1980.

Tone systems as a basis for the tuning of instruments and as determinants of musical perception are extremely resistant to alien cultural influences. Innovations or changes in the tone system at the level of a culture as a whole only occur at the pace of generations. In Africa, as probably elsewhere, it is youths and children who pick up a new tone system (often of foreign introduction) relatively quickly and then carry it on as a novel tradition.

The enculturated tone system is so deeply engraved on an individual's mind that it is unavoidably projected onto external stimuli in the manner of conditioned reflexes. One constantly interprets the acoustic world outside from the angle of one's enculturated tone system, straightening out or "correcting" the incoming stimuli to conform with the expected patterns. Listening habits in the realm of tone systems and scales are probably irreversible, or at least difficult to modify at an age later than adolescent.

It is possible to show experimentally that people educated in Western musical traditions inevitably hear African equiheptatonic tunings in approximation to one of the Western diatonic modes. A good test example which I have often used with various audiences is the music for the large ulimba xylophones, or the bangwe zithers of the Sena group of peoples in southern Malaw,i and the Zambezi valley of Mocambique. This is one of the likely equiheptatonic strongholds in Africa. Test person with a Western musical background- and this included a majority of Western-educated Africans- regularly hear the ulimba pieces in a major or minor mode, often more in minor, though modality is alien to this music.

They react in a similar way to equipentatonic systems. Usually one of the following note series from piano tuning, either C, D, E, G, A or C, D, E, G, Bb or C, D, F, G, A are projected onto these tunings. It is not possible to alter such perceptual reflexes with an effort of will-power.

What can happen, however, is that the listener, after some time, becomes conscious of his own reaction. He discovers that the notes of the other tone system are not entirely identical with the familiar ones of his own musical culture. Some may come very close, others are more different. But even then, he will continue to hear the non-conforming elements as deviations from his own internalized tonal patterns. In contrast to people from the musical culture concerned, he will not


perceive them as an integral part of the system itself. Thus, an intraculturally correct perception actually transcends the possible experience of a foreigner. In the realm of tone systems an individual must have contact with another musical culture from an early age to become accul- turated. It is like learning the correct phonetics of a language. The later one starts the more difficult it is to attain pronunciation comparable to that of a native speaker.

Elastic scales? Observers have quite often been surprised that some African instru-

mentalists when retuning their instruments, apparently reproduce only "approximately" the intervals which the same observer had noticed just shortly before. He finds that it is now a different tuning. But when he asks the musicians they claim that it is the same tuning and to prove it they play the same pieces.

This startling observation has been made many times in Africa and it has also occurred to me. Kufuna Kandonga, the likembe player from Chisende village (Longa area) in south-eastern Angola, 1965, tuned his instrument slightly differently to my ear from week to week.

I recall that I found this an uncomfortable experience at the time, because I had already taken to one particular sequence of c.p.s. which I perceived in relation to the tone system in which I had grown up. Almost secretly I had memorized his tuning with the aid of Western notes corrected by some + or -, and actually oriented myself surprisingly well in his music with this crutch- until one day my perception of Kufuna's notes was painfully disturbed when the instrument got out of tune and he had to retune it. For me, the new tuning was different from the old one, while for Kufuna it was, without doubt, the same. (For a full account of this see Kubik 1980:79-80).

Certain measurable deviations from an ideal tuning pattern are, of course, tolerated in any musical culture. It would be revealing to measure some Western pianos with a Stroboconn immediately before they are played in front of a concert audience. And the deviations tolerated in wind instruments within Western musical cultures are quite surprising. In all cases, the tolerated deviations from the ideal, their positions within the tone systems, and the direction (up or down) in the tuning of individual notes of a scale are culture-dependent and it also depends on the kind of tone system used. The 14 Cents difference between the natural major third of 386 Cents and the tempered third of 400 Cents used on a Western piano, similarly the 31 Cents difference between the natural minor seventh (969 Cents) and the tempered one (1000 Cents), are accepted by musicians working in the Western tone system. A first-year conservatoire music student, learning paino, is normally completely unaware that there is a problem, unless he had been told in music theory lessons. He naturally believes that the notes found on a piano constitute a universally valid tone system. On the other hand in those African tone systems based on the exploitation of the harmonic series from the 4th to the 9th partial, as is the case with the Wagogo of

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Tanzania, thirds of 400 Cents and minor sevenths of 1000 Cents would be intolerable. The margin of tolerance is not the same in different musical cultures and depends on the nature of the tonal-harmonic system. It seems to be wider in tempered scales. In the near-equiheptatonic system of the peoples of eastern Angola (Chokwe, Luvale, Luchazi, Mbwela, etc.) the tolerable deviations are positioned differently both from those in the European twelve-note system and from other African systems such as the tetra/pentatonic system of the Wagogo of Tanzania, or the equipentatonic system of the Baganda. Intra-culturally acceptable deviations from ideal tuning may look confusing from the angle of an alien culture, but may be insignificant in the musical culture concerned.

Slight influctuations in the measurable size of the intervals during the process of retuning an instrument, or in the vocal intonation of the song, often lead Western observers in Africa to hear the same song performed by the same group in different (Western) keys on different days. One day it sounds minor, the next day they seem to be singing major to the Western ear. Pechuel-Loesche's description and notation of the songs of the Bafioti on the Loango Coast in 1907 is a historical example. (Pechuel- Loesche 1907:111-120). Like other observers in similar situations he obtained the uncomfortable impression that these people sang the same songs in a different key every day. Pechuel-Loesche coined the term "Kautschukmelodie" (rubber melody) to describe what he thought was the vocal behaviour of the Bafioti (p. 112).

What actually happened, however, was that the Bafioti sang in no (Western) key at all, that their system did not give comfort to the Western concept of modality. It is possible today to reinterpret Pechuel- Loesche's extensive transcriptions from the viewpoint of present-day understanding of African music. The retranscription of 18th and 19th century European travellers' notations of African music is an important future task for African musicology in the attempt to reconstruct the music history of Africa on the basis of a sequence of all sources, archeo- logical, pictorial, written, etc. Some years ago, I tried to make a start by attempting to find out what Carl Mauch had actually heard when he wrote down some pieces from a mbira dze midzimu lamellophone player near the Zimbabwe ruins in 1872 (Kubik 1971). Pechuel-Loesche is another promising source for someone with an intimate knowledge of the music of the Loango coast to evaluate. Most likely what he heard was singing in a non-modal heptatonic system with harmony in three parts. In this case the question of "major" and "minor " does not arise.

Theoretical knowledge of the principles governing African tonal- harmonic systems may have the advantage of educating listeners in the sense that they become more self-critical towards perception and learn to think twice before naively assuming: What I hear is there. But it has little or no influence on the enculturated auditive habits themselves which have complex histories in individuals. The actual manner in which the ear of an observer puts the unfamiliar sounds of another musical culture into a framework of references with which he is familiar depends on a variety of factors, not the least on his exact regional background (Anglo


Saxon, Northern German, Southern German, Portuguese, educated in Classical music? or "folk" music? Jazz musician? 19th century, 20th century observer, etc.)

The perception of scale patterns is also affected by the timbre structure of individual notes of an instrument. Timbre is not uniform on African musical instruments such as xylophones, lamellophones, etc. Wachsmann noted in 1967:589-590, "In Western music it is precisely this variation in timbre from note to note that singers, pianists and violinists in particular strive to eliminate . . . Do the timbres of xylophone of sansa notes then differ so much from each other that they introduce a structural element of their own into the pattern of the music?"

My answer is decisively yes! Sometimes the timbre structure of specific notes is manipulated deliberately. For instance, Kufuna Kandonga used to attach the little metal buzzing rings only to the four lowest lamellae of his likembe, in order to amplify inherent patterns emerging from these notes. Also on a xylophone differences in the timbre of individual notes have an accidental influence on the appearance of inherent note patterns and the accentual structure of the music. For this reason the same xylophone pieces may sound slightly different when performed on different instruments. Musicians exploit these opportunities by adjusting their phrasings and accentuations to the timbre structure of the instruments they are playing.

The perception of scale patterns is further influenced by the direction in which a series of notes is played. A different impression can be gained, according to whether the "scale" is played from low to high or the reverse. My own initial reaction to the equipentatonic Kiganda scale in 1960 will give an example.

In my first article written in 1960 I reported my experience with one of the xylophones in Uganda which I had learned to play: the amadinda kept in the Uganda Museum and reproduced in the photograph there. "There is another strange phenomenon with the sound of the amadinda and akadinda keys, and this even has an effet on the rhythmic structure of the music. As we pointed out above, the sound of each note is very complex. The three greatest notes (keys X, XI and XII) often sound a third smaller to the ear of a listener. .. When I was playing the amadinda in Kampala the three keys always sounded to my ears as C, D and E+. But listening to the tape-recording of the scale now, most people, including myself, seem to hear instead of these pitches, E, F and G. I have tested a number of persons: when the scale was played upwards the majority heard E, F, G; when it was played downwards most of them heard the basic notes C, D and E. (This is musically and psychologically very interesting). The musicians- as far as I could find out- consider the notes as C, D and E. They have a term for octave: myanjo. The two musicians called Omunazi and Omwawuzi play in myanjo (visually, the spacing apart of the two sticks by five keys, in the two hands of each musician) over the whole range of both xylophones, completely disregarding this thirds effect. Striking for example key VI and XI together, this interval was still called myanjo (octave). And the

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most interesting thing is the number of listeners who had heard the thirds before and then said, "This is an octave now!" (Kubik 1960:8-9).

What had actually happened became clear later. As I could see in sonagrams which were kindly made on my request by the late Professor Dr. Walter Graf in the Phonogrammarchiv, Vienna, the deep notes of this amadinda were not tuned to the fundamentals. The "C", "D" and "E +" in my 1960 description actually corresponded with the 4th partials of the non-appearing fundamentals. They were so dominant that the maker must have taken them as his tuning note. All three notes were tuned to the 4th partials. Like others, Baganda musicians focus their recognition of the tuning pattern to the tone within a sound spectrum which is the loudest: it may be the 1st, 2nd or 4th partial.

The "thirds effect" reported by me arose from the fact, that besides the 4th partial, the 5th was also rather loud on the lowest key. This was an accidental product, without any tonal-harmonic functions in the Kiganda musical system itself. The sound of such a key played in isolation can easily lead one to perceive the extremely strong 5th partial as the representative note.

When the scale was played from bottom to top I first "heard" the 5th partials. From the 4th key onwards I switched back to perceiving the "basic" notes. I and other test persons reacted differently, however, when the scale was played from top to bottom. The "basic" notes which are expected to constitute the equipentatonic scale then developed such strong coherence, that we all heard the pentatonic gestalt to its end, irrespective of the obtrusive "thirds" on the three lowest keys. The "basic" notes also become predominant if one plays in parallel octaves, as is the usual procedure in amadinda music.

The obtrusiveness of the 5th partials in the deep register was even more pronounced on the 22-key akadinda which I used to play with the blind musicians at the Agricultural Training Centre of Salama (1959/60). Their recording of "Omusalaba" (The cross), Ph.A. B 4888, as well as the untitled piece following (B 4889) show the "thirds effect" very clearly.

The margin of tolerance Persons from African musical cultures also reinterpret and "straighten

out" the European diatonic or chromatic tone material according to their respective cultural backgrounds. From the perceptual viewpoint of someone raised in a musical culture which uses a near-equiheptatonic system the Western diatonic scale do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, si may just fall within the margin of tolerance of his system. Such seems to be the case among the Mvele, Bulu and Eton of southern Cameroon, although Eno- Belinga pointed out to me in a conversation in December 1969 in Yaounde that he was quite conscious of the nature of the "fa" in the Bulu scale which was raised towards a "fa diese" (F sharp). He was actually aware of this difference between the Bulu system and the Western diatonic scale. It was because of the nature of this tone, he said, that European missionaries in Cameroon often gave their Bulu disciples a


hard time during church music practice, saying that their intonation of that note was 'wrong'.

The European seven-note scale sounds less strange to people in areas where a diatonic system (i.e. a heptatonic system with two semi-tone steps and a major/minor modality) was traditionally present, such as seems to be the case among the Bongili and Bakota (see recordings Kubik 1964, Ph.A. Vienna) in the north of the Peoples' Republic of Congo. In such areas the Western diatonic scale may even have been perceived as one of the possible, or just acceptable variants of a traditional heptatonic system, especially where ideas of euphony were at work at the same time.

For these reasons the European tone system was apparently assimilated with great ease, especially in the heptatonic areas of Africa, and was quickly adjusted to indigenous conceptions. Accordingly, it was also in the heptatonic areas where the new forms of popular music emerged first, such as Highlife in the coastal areas of Ghana and Nigeria, the neo- traditional xylophone music of Richard Band de Zoe Tele and similar groups in southern Cameroon, the Congo guitar music (in the hexa- and heptatonic areas of Congo/Zaire) and the modern Kenyan guitar music (in the area of the heptatonic Luo of western Kenya). Only southernmost Africa seems to be an exception to this rule. South African musical cultures are penta- or hexatonic, but in this important region the Western tone-system was creatively assimilated at an early stage, i.e., already in the late nineteenth century.

Most other pentatonic areas of Africa, however, have creatively processed a stronger impact from Western (or rather Afro-American) music only from the sixties and seventies onwards, because the more recent Pop and Soul music has often renounced the use of the "three common chords" of the seven-note major scale. It increasingly uses Blues scales and pentatonic systems which are very reminiscent of tone systems found in the Sudanic belt from Dakar (Senegal) to Khartoum. Therefore I was not surprised to find during my visit to the Sudan in 1977 how easily local soul groups had assimilated Blues traits.

In some areas of Africa the adjustment to the European scale is so total that contemporary members of the respective societies do not conceive of any differences between the Western diatonic scale and their "own" tone system. At the climax of efforts towards authenticity in Zaire I discussed this problem with students of the Institut National des Arts in Kinshasa, when I gave a seminar there in December 1974. The young ethno- musicologist Kishilo w'Itunga and others were of the opinion that the "scale" of the Bakongo was identical with the Western diatonic scale. To demonstrate this the students sang me a song in Kikongo which, to the applause of the class, I transcribed "live" on the blackboard. The song had a heptatonic melody with clear subdominant and dominant functions, and before the finalis there was even a leading note. I proposed that the students investigate whether this was perhaps a relatively recent song or an old song whose tonal structure might have been adjusted to the Western tone system now current in the area,

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because of the Western-type school education of the majority of people in Kinshasa.

In the case of the Bakongo the adjustment to Western music may go back far into history, perhaps even as far as the era of the first missionaries in the Kingdom of Congo. The presence of a leading note in this particular case, however, would suggest a more recent process of acculturation based on 19th-20th century influences.

Historically southern Cameroon seems to represent a similar situation. Here, however, the adjustment of regional tone systems to the Western scale started only with the presence of the Germans during the last decades of the 19th century.

From as early as 1960 at least it has been possible to document on tape various stages of adaptation of the old southern Cameroonian tone system with its neutral thirds to the diatonic scale of Western introduction. One may compare my recordings of the mendzaj xylophone ensemble of Gregoire Nang of Yaounde in 1960- which seem to represent a transitional stage- with the group I recorded in the Miami bar, Douala, in 1970 which played a kind of music heavily based on records of Cuban music and Zairean guitar bands. As is evident from my conversations with the leader of the group, he was aiming at the do-re- mi-fa-sol scale.

However, older tuning traditions still persist in the rural and more remote areas, as is exemplified by my recordings of Daniel Mbeng of Minkolong, east of Nanga-Eboko in 1964 and of Bayiege Gaston from Nguelemendouka in 1970 [See Ph.A. Vienna, Nos. B 5103-5107 (Nang), B 17122-17137 (Miami bar), B 8859-8862 (Mbeng) and B 17264-17271 (Bayiege)].

Pie-Claude Ngumu has taken the following stance as to acculturation in the xylophone tunings of southern Cameroon: ". . . Pour le moment je pense que l'essentiel des mendzari beti est qu'ils soient construits sur une echelle de 7 tons differents.-Je me suis permis de tirer profit de cette marge de tolerance. J'ai regle les 7 tons des mendzaj de la maitrise4 au diapason, selon le systeme diatonique de la gamme europeenne . . . Evidemment, ce reglage du diapason ternit de beaucoup la methode traditionnelle. Cette methode n'etait nullement influencee par un son preetabli. Son echelle d'accordement etait bien plus large, quant a la hauteur du ton fondamental." (Ngumu 1976:65).

Ngumu might feel that the traditional southern Cameroonian tuning pattern has a margin of tolerance which is wide enough to accommodate even the Western seven-note diatonic scale. Apparently the traditional scale has had a larger margin of tolerance in Ngumu's area than the Western scale has in its own, with its absolute present-day tuning standard of 440 c.p.s. and fixed semitone and whole tone steps. On the other hand one cannot help suspecting that Ngumu's love for the tuning fork A = 440 might simply be a colonial hangover. After all, before becoming a musicologist Ngumu was a composer of church music and the reign of the "tuning fork" was more than autoritarian in the Yaounde Seminary for young Catholic priests. The late Reverend Arthur M. Jones


must have had a similar impression when he wrote in a review of Pie- Claude Ngumu's book:

Fascinating is the only appropriate word to describe the first half of this modest book . . . The author from boyhood has been a keen xylophone player, and when appointed as parish priest at Yaounde met a first-class xylophone maker and decided to make a set of xylophones for the Cathedral School there . . . He gives both frequency and cents figures for the traditional Beti tuning of the xylophone (which he does not appear to realise is equiheptatonic), and then springs a great surprise on us. He decided to tune the whole orchestra- xylophones included- not to the traditional equiheptatonic scale but to the Western Diatonic Major scale! . . . Of course, if Africans want to adopt our Western scale they are at liberty to do so, but such a volte-face from their traditional tuning will come as a shock to ethnomusicologists, for obviously this changes the whole character of the melodic sound, even though Fr. Ngumu is most careful to preserve the traditional rhythmic structure. (Jones 1978:23-24).

Internalization of colonial norms in music has been the fate of a great number of Western-educated African musicians of the middle genera- tion. During my first stay in Uganda in 1959/60 I was once the guest of George Kakoma. When we began to discuss the "Kiganda scale" he suddenly played me the amadinda version of the famous harp song "Olutali olw'e Nsinsi" (The battle of Nsinsi) with crossing hands on the black keys of his piano. With the right hand he played the okunaga part in parallel octaves, and with his left the interlocking okwawula part. Then he said to me that the "Kiganda scale" was just the same as the black notes of the piano. I was very surprised at the time, because it contradicted all my experience with the instruments of my teacher, Evaristo Muyinda. I do not know how George Kakoma would react today regarding this matter. Although there is a wide margin of tolerance in tuning- due to the presence of consonantal concepts based on fourths- the Kiganda tone-system is based on the use of a standard average interval of approximately 240 Cents. Can it be that the difference of 60 Cents between this equi-pentatonic interval and a European minor third (300 Cents) was tolerated in Kakoma's time by Baganda educated in Western music?

There are indications that he would probably not hold without reser- vations to his views of 1960. In a paper on "Musical Traditions of East Africa" which he presented at the UNESCO conference on African music in Yaounde, 23-27 February 1970, there is an extensive section on "Scales". Unfortunately his paper was published considerably shortened. (See Kakoma 1972). Some of the most interesting parts are missing. In thie printed version it reads (page 78): "Most tribes in East Africa use a five-note scale, although the arrangement of the intervals may differ . .. In Madi (north west Uganda), lyres and harps are tuned approximately to a five-note scale as follows:

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I s f r d (going from the highest to the lowest strings) The solfa approximations are mine. The intervals are sometimes larger

or smaller than implied above." Among the sections deleted from Kakoma's original, which he distrib-

uted among us in Yaounde, there is the following paragraph about transposition of amadinda patterns (pp. 6-7 of the manuscript): "Like in the flute ensemble of the Ganda, each key-note of the amadinda set, beginning with the lowest, may serve as the principal note or the tonic in its own right, to an entirely new scale of five notes. This is called the "Emyanjo" (plural) or "Omwanjo" (singular). Therefore it is possible to play a given song in five different tonal systems. The differences in so doing can bring greater tonal effects than in playing the same Western piece of music on a key-board instrument in more than five different keys."

As to this effect of transposition within the tone system of the Baganda one may also compare Kyagambiddwa (1955) and Wachsmann's discussion of the same subject in a review of Kyagambiddwa's book (Wachsmann 1956:80-81), my discussion of the emiko system in 1960 and 1969, and Lois Anderson's thesis (1968).

What the margin of tolerance actually is in the Kiganda tuning system can be assessed. Evaristo Muyinda, who was my tutor in Uganda in 1959/60, 1961-63 and 1967/68, was tuning his harps (ennanga) with the infallible precision of his inner tuning model. The tunings of his two harps which I recorded in his home in December 1967 in the course of an inspired recording session may be compared to tunings by other musicians and thus illustrate the stability of the Kiganda tone system. It is remarkable that Muyinda's tuning of his big harp in 1967 is congruent within a margin of tolerance of max. -2.82 Hertz and an average of only about ? 1 Hertz in its absolute pitch with the tuning recorded by Klaus Wachsmann eighteen years earlier from Muyinda's teacher, the eminent harpist and court musician Temusewo Mukasa. One of the court songs performed by Evaristo Muyinda, "Olutalo ol'we Nsinsi" has been transcribed in cipher notation in Kubik 1982:218. The three tunings are compared in the following table. Muyinda's harp tunings were kindly measured from my tape recordings by the Reverend Dr. A.M. Jones with a Stroboconn at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London.

Kufuna Kandonga of Angola (1965) was also quite certain about his inner tuning pattern. In spite of a relatively broad margin of tolerance within his hexatonic tunings, he did not accept the intervals of the European diatonic scale. When I once deliberately tuned his likembe so that Western tempered major thirds appeared in place of the neutral thirds he preferred, he took his instrument out of my hand and said that it was wrong. Then he began a lengthy process of retuning.

Under continuous exposure to foreign influence through school songs, mission songs, "national" songs and the bombardment of radio and television programmes oriented towards "international" music, the margin of tolerance is first stretched and then slackened. At this stage the


Evaristo Muyinda, Evaristo Muyinda, Temusewo Mukasa, Recording Kubik, Recording Kubik, Recording Wachsmann, big harp, B 12363, small harp, B 12362 (1950:41) Ph.A. Vienna Ph.A. Vienna

String Hertz Cents String Hertz Cents String Hertz Cents No. (c.p.s.) intervals No. (c.p.s.) intervals No. (c.p.s.) intervals 1 406 1 417 1 405.82

257 261 250 2 350 2 359 2 351.25

233 234 245 3 306 3 314 3 304.90

270 225 244 4 262 4 275 4 264.82

196 240 235 5 233 5 240 5 231.20

257 255 238 6 201 6 207 6 201.51

252 275 236 7 174 7 176 7 175.83

236 201 239 8 152 8 157 8 153.16

alien notes are still perceived from the viewpoint of the indigenous tone system and interpreted in that context. If the exposure, however, is persistent in the next stage, alien and indigenous notes are then felt to be equivalent. They become, if we use linguistic terminology (see Bright 1963:31), variants of a singular toneme. In the final phase of adjustment the indigenous tone system is repressed in favour of the foreign system. It lingers on, however, as a constituent element of a counter-culture.

Transcription examples I. Notation of a xylophone piece with equi-pentatonic tuning

scale (average):

Luganda note names: Cents values:

Cipher notation symbols:

BA FE 0 240 1 2 1 2 I 2

KI JO VU 480 720 960 3 4 5 3 4 5

Note: underlined ciphers = lower octave plain ciphers = middle octave top-lined ciphers = higher octave

BA 1200

KUBIK

56 , 1985 YEARBOOK FOR TRADITIONAL MUSIC

Title of song: "Sematimba ne Kikwabanga"-the story of two princes. Language: Luganda.-Origin: Royal court music of Buganda.- Composed probably soon after 1800.-Version for 12-key amadinda to be performed by three musicians, two of them playing in parallel octaves. Transcribed from a live performance by Evaristo Muyinda and his team in Kampala, December 1959. Cycle number: 36.

/ \ r r 1 r r 1 r r r r 1 r

Okukoonera: . 1.2 . . 2. . 1.22.22.2.1. .2. . 2 . 11

Okunaga: 4 5 2 3 3 5 2 I 2 5 2 2 . 4 . 4 . 2 . I . I . Okun4.5.2.3.3.5.2.1.2.5.2.2.1.4.4.2.1.1.

Okwawula: .1.4.3.1.2.3.4.3.2 2.5.4.3.2.4.4.4.1 1 . 4 . 3 . 1 . 2 . 3 . 4 . 3 . 2 . 2 . 5 . 4 . 3 . 2 . 4 . 4 . 4 . 1 1.4.3.1.2.3.4.3.2.2.5.4.3.2.4.4.4.1

\ /

= entrance point for the okwawula-part

= entrance point for the okukoonera-part

r = beater of the right hand

1 = beater of the left hand

II. Notation of a song sung in a near-equiheptatonic system Title: "Samba papelo"-performed in a mukanda (boys' circumcision school) in southeastern Angola. The performers are men and youths from the village and the initiates (tundanda) in the lodge. Language: Mbwela. Transcribed from recording No. 63/II/3a, at Sakateke, north of Kwitu-Kwanavale, southeastern Angola, Kubik/August 1965.

The nocturnal songs of the mukanda are accompanied with mingongi (concussion sticks) transcribed with symbols A and B for different types of strokes (see also Kubik 1981 for a full discussion of the accompani- ment). The vocal part is transcribed on a seven-line stave, each hori- zontal line representing one pitch-level. The vertical lines indicate- as they do in all modern notations of African music- the elementary pulses, i.e., the smallest time-units carried by the percussion. In this particular case, the human voices create their own pulse lines by dividing a stretch of six elementary pulses into four.

The notation system used here is based on non-durational symbols. A pitch (represented by a dot) is to be held as long as its validity is not cancelled by another pitch (another dot) or the sign for interrupting a sound: /

In the transcription below only the theme of the chorus is reproduced starting about 22 seconds from the beginning of the tape-recording, at the end of a long stretch of parlando-style solo singing. In spite of the reference to tape-recordings given above, this is not strictly a "transcription from tape", because I shared in live performances of this song on several occasions.


Cycle number: 24

Leader: . a ..... ha we ha I I I ,L I

Voices:

Elementary pulses: 430 M.M.

- wel vi - 1i ku-mba- 1'e

I I I I I 1 I I. 1 L T I -- - I - E _ t

' 1 ''~~~~~~~~

I * ' 1 *_A m

I I I I I i i I I I I I I

Minlongi

Mingongi: A . . B . . A . B . . A (sticks) A .B .A . B .A . B .A

I I I I I I I I l Chorus: wol

. B . . A . . B . B . A .B . A . B

I J~ 1 + ~ i I I iI 1

8a-mba pa-pa - lo vi - y -a o vyo

A . B.. A .. B. A . B . . A . B A .B .A .B. . A . B .A A B . B

8a-aba pa -pe - lo ya - ya vi - ya -ya vyo vyp

A . B .. A . B.. A.. B.. A. .. A .B.A. .B.A . B .A.B.A. B.A. B.

I I II 111 I I 111 1 1 11 1 Sa-aba pa - p -lo vi - ya -ya vyo vyo

A .. B . A .. B.. A. B. A. ...B. A . B . A.B.A. B. A.B.A. B.

-- I I I I

I , I , , , ... i . I . I .. . .

KUBIK

---


-wel Ha -we

I I I; J I t I 1 r + 1 I I II-11 1

-

Wo yol Wo yo ya - y

A .. B ..A .. B..A.. B . A . B.. A . A. B A B .. A . B. A.B . B

i. I i : I,l! 1'1 I'll' 1 i 1 1 i I 1 T i 1l1

vi - 11 ku - mba-la Sa-mba pa - pe -lo na-na vi-

A . B . . A.. B . A . B. A . B..

A .B .A. B A . B .A .B B . A. B

yj-a - 1 1 III I I I ya - ya vyo vyo A . . B . . A . A . B . A . B .

.B. . A . .B . A . . B. A . B . A . B. A.B.A . B

NOTES

1. There is an interesting testimony to the popularity of German harmonicas such as "Junker Kai Mundharmonica" in Mission schools of southern Cameroon before World War I, to be found in a letter by a schoolboy published in the Mission magazine Stern von Afrika, No. 6/XVI, 1909:95.

2. In 1981 I was able to visit Ambasa's village under the guidance of Pie-Claude Ngumu, and film the music, besides making snatches of tuning adjustments and tuning check phrases. (Cinefilm 40, Nov. 1, 1981, Collection Kubik/Aliya, Vienna).

3. See LP records: a) The Kachamba Brothers' Band, Chichewa, Malawui 1972. AEL Series Phono- graphica 1, Vienna 1972. (Available from the Institute of African Studies, University of Zambia, P.O. Box 30900, Lusaka). b) Donald Kachamba's Kwela Band 1978, Austromechana 0120240, Jazzclub Wiesen (Austria), 1978. (Available from: Peter Posch, Eisenstatterstrasse 40, A-7202 Sauerbrunn, Austria). c) Donald Kachamba's Band. Simanje-manje and Kwela from Malawhi, A.I.T. Records, Kenya Ltd., Nairobi, GKA 01, 1979. (Available from A.I.T. Records, P.O. Box 41152, Nairobi). d) Video-Film of Donald Kachamba's solo guitar playing June 1983, at the Musik- ethnologische Abteilung, Museum fur Volkerkunde, Berlin-West.

4. Maitrise des Chanteurs a la Croix d'ebene de la Cathedral de Yaounde, Ngumu's own church music ensemble.


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African Tones

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