Track 10 from Saydisc "Percussion Around the World" - notes from Maureen Hanke.
'Busoga Fishermen' is a recording of fishermen who have migrated to Lake Kyoga, East Africa.
They are singing simply because they are happy.
In Africa, music is often played for rites of passages, births, deaths, puberty, marriage, for socialising, for therapy and healing.
This piece of music features instruments and music making traditional to areas in East Africa. The singers accompany themselves on the mbira (referred to in the West as the thumb piano).
The mbira is a collection of tuned metal tongues fitted to a box or a plain board in such a way that one end of the tongue can vibrate freely. The free ends of the tongues are depressed and released by the player using thumbs or fingers. Very often the sound is made to buzz by attaching shells or metal rattles to the board or the resonator or both. the tuning of the tongues varies from region to region.
( in a music session listen for the rattle. Listen and discuss the differences between the tune which is sung and the accompaniment)
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