Traditional South African Music
(and how it has changed and been adapted)
By: Sarah-Bracha Cohen
•
1000CE:
– Imported crops and trade enabled Bantu people of
– Central and West Africa to gain population and migrateto occupy most of Central and South
Africa – displacing Pygmy and Bushmen peoples.
•
The Zulu people adopted the guitar following its introduction by the Portuguese in the 16th
century, (and was locally and cheaply made by the 1930s). Zulu music incorporates
rhythm, melody and harmony, for that’s how they could communicate more
easily, due to their hard language. The Zulu people live mainly in KwaZulu-Natal Province,
South Africa. The Zulu Kingdom played a major role in constantly effecting the changes in music
throughout southern Africa’s history.
•
1600s:
– In the Dutch colonial era, from the 17th century on, indigenous tribes people and slaves
imported from the east adapted Western musical instruments and ideas.
– 1652:
– Dutch settle in Capetown, South Africa.
• San (Bushmen) and Khoikhoin (Hottentot) Southern Africa
– The Khoi-Khoi, had lived in southern Africa since the 5th century AD. At the time of the
arrival of white settlers in 1652 developed the ramkie, a guitar with three or four
strings, based on that of Malabar slaves. They used it to blend Khoi and Western folk
songs.
– Then there was the mamokhorong. It was a single-string violin that was used
by the Khoi in their own music making and in the dances of the colonial
centre, Cape Town, which rapidly became a melting pot of cultural influences from all over
–
the world.
The governor of the Cape had his own slave orchestra in the 1670s.
1800s
•
In a style similar to that of British marching military bands, coloured (mixed race) bands of
musicians began parading through the streets of Cape Town in the early 1820s, This tradition has
continued to the present day with the great carnival held in Cape Town every New Year.
•
The penetration of missionaries into the interior over the succeeding centuries also had a
profound influence on South African musical styles. In the late 1800s, early African composers
began composing hymns that drew on traditional Xhosa harmonic patterns--features
drums, rattles, whistles, flutes, mouth harps, and stringed-instruments and especially
group singing accompanied by hand clapping.
•
The development of a black urban proletariat and the movement of many black workers to the
mines meant that differing regional traditional folk music met and began to flow into one
another. Western instrumentation was used to adapt rural songs, which in turn started to
influence the development of new hybrid styles of music-making (as well as dances) in the
developing urban centres.
•
In the mid-1800s, travelling minstrel shows began to visit South Africa. These minstrels were at
first white performers in "black-face", but by the 1860s black American minstrel troupes had begun
to tour the country. They sang spirituals of the American South, and influenced many South
African groups to form themselves into similar choirs; soon regular meetings and competitions
between such choirs were popular, forming an entire subculture that continues to this day. One of
the most famous minstrels to impact South African music was the Virginia Jubilee Singers.
•
In the late-1800s, the Marabi music style formed in the slum yards that resulted from the
increasing urbanization of black South Africans into mining centres such as the Witwatersrand.
The sound of marabi was intended to draw people into the shebeens (bars selling homemade
liquor or skokiaan) and then to get them dancing. Marabi was played on pianos with
accompaniment from pebble-filled cans. Over the succeeding decades, the marabi-swing style
developed into early mbaqanga, the most distinctive form of South African jazz.
•
•
Early—Mid-1900s
Early 1900s:
– South African popular music takes off, due to the first commercial recordings (1912) and broadcast
radio for black listeners (1930s).
– Marabi's melodies found their way into the sounds of the bigger dance bands, modelled on
American swing groups. Marabi added to their distinctively South African style. Such bands, which
produced the first generation of professional black musicians in South Africa, achieved considerable
popularity; among both blacks and whites.
– Spread of Zulu, a cappella singing from the Natal area to much of South Africa. The tradition of
minstrelsy, joined with other forms, contributed to the development of isicathamiya (a form of
the Zulu a cappella music). This music form had its first major hit in 1939 with the song "Mbube",
an adaptation of a traditional Zulu melody which has been reused numerous times since, and is
commonly known as "The Lion Sleeps Tonight".
Mid 1900s:
– South African music came into International prominence with the formation of Kwela music, which
was greatly influenced by Marabi sounds. The primary instrument of kwela, in the beginning, was
the pennywhistle, a cheap and simple instrument that was taken up by street performers in the
shantytowns.
– The older strains of marabi and kwela saw the birth of mbaqanga, the mode of African-inflected
jazz.
– Later in the 1950s a new black urban music culture started to emerge in Sophiatown. Marabi met
with traditional dance styles such as the Zulu indlamu and American big band swing. The
indlamu tendency resulted in the "African stomp" style, giving a notably African rhythmic
impulse to the music.
– From the 1960s onward, more and more white rockers and pop groups appeared to appeal to
white audiences in a segregated South Africa.
– The South African government launched a development program for Bantu Radio in order to foster
separate development and encourage independence for the Bantustans—people in territory set
aside for black inhabitants of South Africa and South-Western Africa (now Namibia), as part of the
policy of apartheid. Though the government had expected Bantu Radio to play folk music,
African music had developed into numerous pop genres, and the nascent recording studios
used radio to push their pop stars. The new focus on radio led to a government crackdown on
lyrics, censoring songs which were considered a "public hazard".
Late 1900s—modern times
•
Late 1900s:
– African countries gained independence from colonial powers. New governments
sponsored traditional arts and fostered African nationalism.
– Ladysmith Black Mambazo became perhaps the biggest stars in South Africa's history,
reforming the sound of Zulu a cappella.
– American disco was imported to South Africa, and disco beats were added to soul music.
–
South African children rebelled en masse against apartheid and governmental authority, and a vibrant, youthful
counterculture was created, with music as an integral part of its focus. Few South African bands gained a
lasting success during this period, however, with the exception of the Movers, who used
marabi elements in their soul. Rabbitt disbanded.
–
–
–
–
–
–
•
The 1980s saw the appearance of Afro-jazz bands, marrying the sounds of American fusion and ancient
African patterns, to considerable commercial success. A genre of music referred to as ‘bubblegum' emerged
from the townships.
By the mid-1980s a white alternative rock culture had developed, and showed considerable diversity. At
the same time, a crossover was beginning to happen between black and white musicians.
Johnny Clegg, a sociologist who learnt so much about Zulu music and dance that he
formed his own group, Juluka. Juluka's ability to mix traditional Zulu music with white pop and
folk was in itself a challenge to the racial boundaries the apartheid regime attempted to erect between blacks and
whites. With often a more pop-driven style, other bands followed the crossover trail blazed
by Clegg (hailed overseas as "the white Zulu"), whose later band, Savuka, continued to reproduce his earlier
success.
In 1980, reggae begins to take hold across Africa.
Vusi Ximba's Siyakudamisa (1992) was perhaps the most memorable Zulu-traditional album of the later 20th
century, and drew controversy for racy, comedic lyrics.
In 1994, South African media was liberalized and new musical styles arose.
2000s:
–
–
Free of the baggage of apartheid, Afrikaans music has grown in popularity.
A major addition to this style of music is Fokofpolisiekar, a Cape Town-based punk rock band. Their
positive move away from the stigma attached to Afrikaans culture has attracted a lot of publicity in South Africa
and has given them a considerable amount of fame.
Facts: Traditional Music
• Polyrhythm: rhythms that occur simultaneously in two
different meters, or with different starting points.
• Call-and-Response: exchange between a soloist and a
• group.
• Ostinato: a short pattern that repeats over and over.
• Predominance of Percussion
• Duality of Sound (Background Shimmer)
• Connection between music & langauge
• Expectation of Participation in Arts
• Connection between Art Forms: music, dance, poetry,
song.
"FISH MBILA "
by Albert Munyai
Man cannot live without water.
All across Africa, water is a most
precious resource.
"COW HORN
MBILA (XYLOPHONE)"
It is of vast spiritual significance:
water moves and flows, it is the
giver and sustainer of life.
In Venda, the custodian of water is
the fish.
A depiction of fish pays homage to
that which protects water, ensuring
the prosperity and well being of
the community.
The mbila in the shape of a cow gives thanks to South Africa..
It celebrates the tribal laws and culture which centers around
cattle
The cow is a celebrated and spiritually revered animal.
It is considered sacred since it sacrifices itself entirely: giving
meat for food, hides for clothing, horns for vessels and intestines
for various uses.
The cow gives what the bull cannot — nourishment through milk
and a womb to gestate new cattle.
“COW MBILA”
by Albert Munyai
The musical keys carry the importance of symbolizing well
balanced emotions (half the register is smiling, the other half is
crying).
"NGOMA
LUNGUNDU"
by Noria
Mabasa
"TALL
MAN
MBILA"
by Albert
Munyai
“Voice of the
Ancestors” is a gigantic
Murumba carved from
an ancestor tree (a very
old tree). The Murumba
is a baritone drum with
a conical resonator.
"Mandamas
wa a Tikwa
Ngamalala PAINTED
DRUM"
by Albert
Munyai
Zulu
Skin
Drums
With the musical and sculptural
work, we find Albert Munyai’s
first mbila (xylophone). The
walking man wears traditional
beads around his neck, stating
his Venda origins. His hand is
placed on his stomach to send
the energy that dwells there,
through to his head. It is with
the placement of the drum (on
top of the figures head) that this
energy is transformed into
rhythm. The keys of the mbila
are placed along the vertebrae
of the spinal column — the man
carries and produces music
from within his backbone.
Shakers
- Large
Double
Single
Calabash
Shaker
Medium Single Shaker
Shakers - Small Double
MBEKWENI
MARIMBA
BAND
Ramkie-- guitarlike instrument
Kalimbas
The Soweto Gospel Choir won their second
consecutive Grammy Award in the category
best traditional world music for their album
'African Spirit' in February 2008
Zulu
Boys
Dancing
Ladysmith Black Mambazo
music and videos
• http://batayin.org/projects/musicfrombatayi
n.htm
• http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.p
hp?storyId=1672483
• http://video.google.com/videosearch?client
=safari&rls=en&q=traditional%20south%2
0african%20music&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF8&safe=active&um=1&sa=N&tab=wv#
Sources:
• http://www.smccd.edu/accounts/lapuzd/Lectures/Africa%
20Notes.pdf
• http://www.aism.co.za/aismnew/appcontext/subcat.asp?
catid=CMus0001&catname=Musical%20Instr
• http://www.mukondeni.com/html/Musical%20Instruments
.htm
• http://www.sahistory.org.za/pages/chronology/specialchrono/society/mucic.htm
• www.Google.com
• www.southafrica.info
• www.wikipedia.org