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Ethno-everything




I remember from a lecture on tribal music that there is a tendency in some
cultures to consider all things communal, including the notes in music.  They
will write music that could be played on one instrument, but it is designed so
that two or more performers alternate notes.  By splitting notes like this, you
end up with primitive stereo. There are even some cultures where every man in
the village is part of the concert.  Community does make the drudgery of many
activities fun.  I remember unloading a truck with someone from Ghana when I was
on grounds crew in college.  She went to the truck, grabbed one end of the first
30 pound bag, and waited for me to take the other.  I did, and we ran the bag to
the pile, and repeated this for every one, smiling at each other the whole time.
Normally in Western culture, each person would carry a bag and you would simply
alternate - or at most, you would bucket brigade.  This was slower, but much
easier and much more fun.

I recently realized that Celtic, Arabic, and Spanish music have very similar
qualities, but I don't know the terms well enough to describe what I'm noticing
as common.  I can see Arabic and Spanish rooted in the Muslim expansions and
Mediterranean commonalties.  I can also see Middle Eastern and Celtic having
similar roots, since a lot of the early Celtic Christian monastic culture was
rooted in the "desert fathers" in areas like Ethiopia and the more northern
Coptic sects (coincidentally, an Ethiopian Cross and a Celtic Cross are very
similar).  However, the Celtic link is pre-muslim, unless you count the much
later cultural link between Spain and Ireland.  Or it may simply be a
commonality of instruments that makes it look similarly rooted.  Unfortunately,
I have about 20 pieces to a 100 piece puzzle.  Anyone else have any insights on
this one?

Felonius Monk was a pun costume at the most recent Mensa Halloween convention
costume contest here in Chicago.  I was Obi Wan Valdez ("Each morning I feel a
great disturbance in The Force, as if millions of coffee beans were crying out
at once, and then going silent").  Neither one of us won.  We lost to "One
Nightstand" (a woman in a table skirt, so that she looked like she was a table
from the waist down - she even had a working lamp on the table).  I did win a
few years ago with "Fisherman's Worf" - a Klingon with tackle box, life vest,
flannel and fishing rod.

Ysobelle, is our resident ethnomusicologist doing anything for the tribute
album?  That could be fun.  Tonal scales could be a real headache, though.
Maybe a culture that uses our scale would work, or a superset of it.


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