Archive Recording Reviews
Title: Master fiddlers of Dagbon [sound recording]. Published/distributed: Cambridge, Mass.: Rounder, p2001. Publisher number: CD 82161-5086-2 Rounder. Archive Call Number: ARCD 1589
Master Fiddlers of Dagbon is a recording of the fiddlers of the Dagbamba people, who are located in the northern area of Ghana. For the Dagbamba, there are many types of musical styles, from the “talking drums” to the recreational dancing music; each incorporates its own arrangement of instruments, such as the lunga, the gungon as well as multiple types of bowed lutes and fiddles. It is within this vein of instrumentality that our recording rests.
The goonji or the gondze is one of the most popular instruments in Dagbon, but its notoriety exists in many other geopolitical regions, albeit by other names. The one string fiddle in Hausa is known as the goge, while in Songhay it is the godji. In earlier times, the players in Dagbon inherited their craft from kinsmen and were compelled to pursue it as a career. An interesting note about Dagbon musicians is that they continue to work in other vocations while maintaining a musical career. In the rural areas of Dagbon there just aren’t enough opportunities for playing to sustain a full time musician. Of late, the popularity of the goonji and non-drumming traditions has grown, and the commoners have become more well to do. Because of this you will now find many more musicians in the market places, meandering about playing music. Also it should be noted that the goonji music is strongly danceable music, which adds tremendously to its popularity in Northern Ghana and the surrounding areas.
Because the music style is so tied to dancing, the author of the article accompanying this album, John Chernoff, argues that “Dagbamba fiddlers and rattle players surround you when you dance, the music … goes right into your body. Until you experience the music in this way, it is hard to believe that so much intensity and energy can come from an ensemble of fiddles.” This helps us to understand the social context of some of the fiddle songs. While many of the songs are praise songs or life event songs (songs having to do with birth, death, and marriage), there is the underlying concept of the dance. I have heard it explained that even if the music were the same, and the dancing was different, it is a completely different song.
In goonji songs, the vocal phrasing of the chorus or responsive line is duplicated in responsive patterns by the fiddles. This pattern is repeated in the beginning for as long as it takes to establish the songs’ rhythmic and melodic dynamic. Songs generally quicken while building tempo and intensity. Rattles have complementary roles but generally keep the beat, allowing the melody of the fiddler to take the main stage. Most goonji songs are collections of proverbs that have been identified with people as praise-names. As people became more affluent and able to patronize the fiddlers, the commoners began to acquire praise names as well.
One of the things I noticed on this album was how the fiddlers generally stay together, playing the same melodic line. On Track 5, entitled “Ka Mi Zuhiri Maanga” (I have invited myself), the melodic portion of the song follows this axiom completely. In terms of percussive elements, there are no membranophones, but several rattlers can be heard. I couldn’t tell if the rattlers were some distance from the fiddlers, or if the microphone simply picked up the sound of the chordophones. Perhaps it was the spacing of the group as well. Towards the end of this song, both the melody and the rhythm become repetitive. The vocals are call and response. This song was originally written for the Tugulana Iddi (chief Iddi) of the town of Tugu. In essence, this is a praise song about musicians who have come to the king uninvited; one of the lines states, “You have not invited me but I have come.” After several phrases like this, the singer begins to call the names of past chieftains and implores them to “walk majestically.” One more interesting note about this song, which is characteristic of most of the songs on the album, is the length. This song was 7 minutes 12 seconds long, which is one of the shortest on this album.
Track 8 on the album, “Wariye Jalima Mai Makada” (the prince who has many goonji players), is somewhat similar to “Ka Mi Zuhiri Maanga.” This song contained call and response techniques, but also seemed to be incorporating some harmonizing. I found this really interesting, for while the fiddlers are still playing almost the same melodic lines, they sing different vocal melodies. The harmonizing is generally present in an overlap between the call and the response. This song was written for the chief of Savelugu (Savelugu-naa Mahami), and the lyrics are essentially proverbs. With lyrics like “someone who destroys and someone who builds are never the same,” the song contains a provincial aspect not found in many of the other songs on this album. The chorus for this song is “the prince should catch and collect money for us.” I found it interesting that proverbs were used to praise. This further reinforces the idea of patronage among Dagbon musicians.
Throughout the recording there is some hissing and popping. But for the most part the album is fine quality; despite the fact that the music was recorded using a single microphone placed several feet away. Overall, I thought this album did a good job of creating a diverse body of music. One critique, however, is that the same group of musicians were used to perform all the songs. I am sure that different artists have their own stylistic tendencies, and it would have been helpful, for comparative reasons, if there was a way to distinguish the local musicians’ own playing style from the actual cultural influences. I also thought it would have been good if the liner notes on the album had been a bit more in depth about the songs. While there was some information regarding the subject matter, it was often relegated to only a small proportion of the actual writing. In summation, this record was of good quality for a field recording, and does a good job of displaying and typifying Dagbon fiddler music.
Written by Patrick Doust (Winter 2005)
References: DjeDje, Jacqueline Cogdell. 1982. “The Concept of Patronage: An examination of Hausa and Dagomba One String Fiddle Traditions,” Journal of African Studies 9:116-127.
Title: The Old Highlife. Published/distributed: San Diego, CA: Art Hurts Records, 2001. Archive Call Number: ARCD 1343
This thirteen-track collection of songs of “old” highlife represents an era from not too long ago of easy-going, upbeat tunes and simple lives. Highlife music is a fusion of western jazz, calypso, classical guitar, rock and roll, and traditional African beats. Africans left the country in the past half-decade either forcibly through slavery or voluntarily through travel, and when they returned they brought back music and cultural ideas from the regions they visited. In Ghana, especially, the locals began to take what they learned overseas and create new songs with themes of “looking for a higher life.” As it spread over to Nigeria, highlife branched out to include broader themes but it still retained the upbeat jazzy sound that is one of its signature characteristics.
All 57 minutes of The Old Highlife is comprised of decades-old classic songs as well as some written and recorded just a few years ago. The artists, Nana Opoku Agyemang and Amankwah Ntori (better known as “Roadmaster”), have seen and influenced the growth of highlife music since it took root in their hometown of Kumasi, Ghana, decades ago. Roadmaster, who gained his nickname from his mother for his ability to walk very long distances on foot, is the vocalist of the group (Art Hurts). Agyemang plays the guitar and leads the band, and he and Roadmaster co-write the songs. Although not featured in this album, the duo has created a band called The Hi-Life Royals that tours Africa performing the old style highlife music.
The music on The Old Highlife ranges from a funeral medley to praise songs of Jesus and of Allah to a typical love song. Despite this variation of themes among the different songs, use of essentially the same instruments in each song causes them to sound almost too similar to each other. The liner notes feature translations of the lyrics from Twi, the musicians’ native tongue, to English, which helps non-Twi speakers understand the songs better, but the language barrier in the songs themselves can make a listener believe “they all sound the same.” All thirteen songs feature either an electric or an acoustic guitar or both, as well as an electric bass. Most of the songs contain drums and a synthesizer as well. These instruments together create a very relaxing yet fast-paced soft-rock sound with a jazz-influenced bass line and a very Caribbean feel to it. The nice, clear sound quality of recording makes it easy to hear the clean melodic riffs from the guitars and bass, which differs from the traditionally rougher, “buzzy” sounding aesthetic preferred in a lot of music in Africa.
The first track of the album, a funeral medley, is not what one may think at first. Although it deals with mourning and sadness, the funeral medley is not a somber song in the Western sense. The ever-present electric guitar is plucked for a soft yet upbeat melody, and the muted drumbeats keep the pace of the song fast. Without knowing the name of the song, non-Twi speakers would not guess that its theme is death. Only the slightly anguished-sounding voices during some parts of the song might give off a mournful feeling. Four short songs comprise this medley. The first mourns the passing of a barren woman, the second laments the fact that death is impartial to whom it chooses for death, the third begs for advice on how to continue on after the loss of a mother, and the fourth song, in contrast to the previous three, says to be joyous in the face of death.
Another notable selection in this collection is the tenth track, “Akosua.” This song is about a marriage that is in trouble. The singer, who is the husband, pleads with his wife to help him work out their troubles, as he does not want to see her go. The song plays out somewhat like a conversation; the vocalist sings a verse and backup singers provide harmony in the follow-up line. In other parts, the singer almost sounds like he is talking, but is doing so in a melodic manner. All the songs in the album are polyphonic, including “Akosua,” but Akosua also includes some vocal homophony throughout. The two things most apparent to me while listening to the song, however, are the rhythmic clave and the skillfully played acoustic guitar, which sounds like it is being played in the classical style. Hopefully the “husband’s” good singing and excellent guitar playing will convince the wife to stay with him.
Those two songs stood out the most in my mind, but picking them over eleven other great tracks was a strain, because the CD as a whole is very unique in itself. Despite heavy Western and Caribbean influences on the music, the vocals make it distinctly African. They have a much raspier, rougher quality than some Western singers. Another interesting component in many tracks of The Old Highlife is the “echoing” of the main singer by the backup singers. This technique of repeating phrases gives the lyrics an almost rhythmic quality rather than a melodic one. In some songs, the synthesizer is heavily used in such a way that the music has a disco quality to it. Finally, although all the songs are in Twi, some English words are used in the lyrics and even in one of the titles (Track 4: Plane Fare). Although the English words are few and far between, they make the songs sound a little less different at times.
It is not often that I sit down and listen to a CD of music with words I do not understand and be enthralled by the rhythm and melody so much that understanding is not necessary. Personally, the first thing I normally look for in a song is great lyrics, and instrumentals and sound come next. But since appreciating the lyrics directly was not an option here, I concentrated on hearing the melodies and rhythms that were the product of decades of practice and mastery of the craft. After reading the liner notes to see what each song was all about, I finally understood the meaning behind the music. Still, the words were only secondary to me, and not crucial to my enjoyment of the upbeat, relaxing, danceable, and jazzy quality of The Old Highlife.
Written by Bryan Jue
GALA Final Report
Gospel Archiving in Los Angeles (GALA) was a success. What began as a partnership between the UCLA Ethnomusicology Archive and The Heritage Music Foundation (HMF) has grown into what we expect will be a lasting relationship between UCLA and the Gospel Music community in Los Angeles.
In the span of one-year we more than realized the five goals laid out in our GALA proposal:
Goal 1: “Helping HMF to plan for Gospel House.” As stated in the proposal, one of HMF’s primary goals is to establish a Gospel House, a center for Gospel education and preservation in Los Angeles. During the course of GALA, we have become acquainted with HMF’s existing plans for the Gospel House and have worked with HMF in taking the next step: developing a strategic plan for the House. This strategic plan clarifies HMF’s vision, collection development, access, preservation, funding, and outreach policies for the House. We expect HMF will use this plan to develop sound funding proposals for the construction and maintenance of their Gospel House.
Goal 2: “Expanding LA based Gospel and related music collections in the Archive and at HMF.” Before the project officially began, the Heritage Music Foundation transferred nearly 500 commercial recordings to the Ethnomusicology Archive. As described below (Goal 3), Archive technicians processed all of this material and digitized the vast majority of it. HMF has more material that they plan on depositing this summer.
Other organizations and individual community members have also deposited their commercial and non-commercial Gospel recordings into the Archive as part of GALA. For example, besides the GALA Collection, we have established a Saint Paul Baptist Church Collection, an Ineze Caston Collection, a Mable Wells Collection, a Erwin Parnes Collection--which includes material related to Dr. Albert McNeil--and expanded upon our already existing John and Vermya Phillips Collection.1 And though funding for GALA has ended, we will continue to encourage and work with community members who wish to deposit their materials into the Archive.
Beyond already existing commercial recordings, the Archive and HMF worked together to make extensive audio and video recordings of Gospel and Gospel-related performances in and around the greater LA area. We documented the vast majority of HMF events over the course of the grant, as well as a number of non-HMF Gospel concerts and events. In addition to documenting performances, Professor DjeDje conducted oral histories with key people in the Gospel community. All of the materials that have resulted in our documentation efforts—including video recordings, sound recordings, photographs, and field notes—are a part of the GALA Collection.
A finding aid for the GALA, Phillips, Caston, Wells, and the Saint Paul Baptist Church Collections will be made available on the Online Archive of California (OAC): http://www.oac.cdlib.org/. All materials in the GALA Collection have been entered into our finding aid database in preparation for uploading to the OAC. Over the course of summer 2005 we will be editing this document so that it can be available for public access in the fall.
The Ethnomusicology Archive will store the GALA Collection and all other collections created as a part of GALA in the secure and climate-controlled environs of the Southern Regional Library Facility. And though this earthquake resistant and bunker-like complex provides optimal conservation standards for collections, gaining access to the recordings takes only a day’s notice.
Goal 3: Digitizing and increasing access to Gospel collections held by HMF and others: The Archive, in association with HMF, made huge strides in digitizing and increasing access to the HMF collection of Gospel music. As mentioned above, we processed all of HMF’s commercial materials (readying them in the OAC in finding aid database) and digitized the vast majority of them in order to increase their accessibility. Additionally, many viewing and listening copies of the GALA materials have already been made.
Goal 4: Hosting an end-of-the-project symposium at UCLA. We punctuated the end of the grant-funded portion of GALA by hosting an event at Greater New Bethel Baptist Church, the home church and base for our community partner, Margaret Pleasant Douroux, Chief Executive Officer of HMF. This event allowed GALA participants to celebrate the creation of a new collection and plan for further collaborations. The event and concert were documented and added to the GALA Collection. For more information about the event, see http://www.ethnomusic.ucla.edu/archive/galaeventpr.htm
Goal 5: “Establishing and maintaining a Community Based Organization (CBO) server.” Over the course of GALA, we purchased, installed, and began using a CBO server. After careful deliberating our options for housing the server, we installed it in Academic Technology Services (ATS): http://www.ats.ucla.edu/. ATS has been incredibly helpful and generous with both their time and resources, as has the Apple engineer assigned to UCLA.
This server is currently up and running, and maintained by the Archive. Video from both GALA and AFAMILA (UCLA in LA grant from 2003-04) can be accessed from the server via our website at http://www.ethnomusic.ucla.edu/archive/gallery.htm (we will be uploading more video from GALA and AFAMILA over the summer). The sounds, images, and videos featured on this page are publicly accessible, though we have the ability to provide password-protected access to those files that are given restricted circulation status by the artists. Besides giving us a generous capacity to stream media, the server will allow select GALA and AFAMILA community members to upload digital copies of recordings via the Internet. We strongly believe that this CBO server will further the mission of HMF and give artists easy access to their recordings, while at the same time creating links among community-based organizations.
It is difficult to estimate the number of people who were reached by GALA. Beyond many people who participated in GALA by either working for the project or being present at an event being documented, GALA did receive some noteworthy press: UCLA Magazine (Summer 2004) and two articles in the Los Angeles Sentinel (October 2004 and March 2005). What may be more significant than the number of people exposed to GALA in 2004-05 is the future impact of GALA. After all, the GALA Collection will be here long beyond any of us. We expect future generations of community members and researchers to access—and hopefully continue to contribute to—GALA well into this century and beyond.
Both the Archive and HMF benefited from GALA in important ways. For example, with GALA, the Ethnomusicology Archive has made a concerted effort to document Gospel music cultures. Ethnomusicology has traditionally focused on researching and interpreting music from around the globe, not from around the block. Now, with GALA—and before it, AFAMILA—the Archive has widened its purview to include local musics. With GALA and AFAMILA the Archive has also adopted what is referred to a documentalist approach to archiving. Instead of just waiting for collections to come to the Archive, the Archive is now actively collecting. This marks an important and proactive shift in the Archive’s collection development strategy.
HMF’s capacity as an organization has also been increased as a result of GALA. Their collection, one that will eventually end up in the proposed Gospel House, has been described, organized, and in great part digitized. Nearly every event they organized over the course of the grant was documented. All of these recordings can, in turn, be used by HMF to promote their activities in the years to come. In addition, the CBO Server gives HMF, and other community organizations, access to a virtual space in which their events can be widely distributed and accessed. Finally, the strategic plan should aid HMF in planning for their Gospel House and securing funding for such ventures.
The partners evaluated their success with GALA by reviewing what progress had been made on the goals laid in the proposal. In particular, since one HMF member -- Glenn Ford -- worked in the UCLA Ethnomusicology Archive on GALA over spring 2005, we were able to regularly update him and, by association, HMF on the our progress with the grant. Based upon these experiences, we have come to the conclusion that we exceeded expectations.
GALA is over, but the partnership continues. As HMF’s Chief Executive Officer Margaret Pleasant Douroux states, “We do intend to continue to archive with UCLA and it is my hope that we can continue to associate ourselves with UCLA as a community partner.”
1. Not only is St. Paul’s Echoes of Eden Choir the first church choir in the United States to release a gospel recording on a major recording label (Capitol Records), the church was an important center for gospel music in Los Angeles from the 1940s to the 1980s. Ineze C. Caston, of Trinity Baptist Church, was well known both in Los Angeles and throughout the state of California for directing gospel church choirs. Mable Wells, a member of several church and community choirs in the city, is a gospel enthusiast and collector. DJ announcers John and Vermya Phillips, who have amassed an enormous collection classic gospel recordings, were known both locally and nationally from the 1940s to the 1990s for hosting gospel radio programs.
