Post #199037 by I dream of tiki on Sat, Nov 19, 2005 7:32 PM

Back to musical instument. Not just any ol' flute....

KWAKUMBA: RARE FLUTES & FLUTE STOPPERS FROM PAPUA NEW GUINEA
Flutes known for being the longest in the world

"Traditional Papua New Guinean musical instruments are primitive and fall mainly into the percussion and wind categories.

The Sepik and Highlands peoples have developed a variety of flutes constructed of lengths of bamboo or cane & coconut shells. They bear elaborately handcarved wooden stoppers depicting human, animal or bird totems additionally adorned with hair, cassowary or casoar feathers, vegetable fibers, shells, seeds and clay-based paints like ochre. They are played during rituals and are considered to be voices of spirits."

"Like all the musical instruments, the flutes are used during rituals and initiations and symbolize the voices of the clan’s ancestor spirits and of the ancestral world & represent supernatural beings. They are played at specific events, usually in pairs. In the ceremonies of worship or initiation, two players must play about it at the same time."

"The long flutes have a low, melodic tone which resonates into the damp, tropical air. When two experienced men play a pair of the shorter flutes, their lively duet bounces back and forth like jazz. Traditionally, village women, children and uninitiated men are not allowed to see the flutes being played during the rituals since they are considered to be voices of the spirits so they are kept away from the women and the children like all the crowned objects.

Kwakumba is the name of the Bamboo flutes found in the Highlands of PNG. Traditionally only initiated men can play them. They are always played in pairs and are pitched slightly apart, the lower pitch - the masculine and the higher pitch - the feminine. Traditionally they play interlocking triplet rhythms that evoke sounds of the bush and village. Airi Ingram was taught Kwakumba by Tony Subam and Pius Wasi from East Sepik Province."

Latmul Sacred Flute Players 1999, Middle Sepik, Mumeri Village

"The Mumeri people originally came from Kamindimbit Village on the Sepik. During WWII, the elders worried that bombing raids might wipe out their whole village, so some of the people moved up the Korosameri River to its junction with the Blackwater River for safety.

The Mumeri men's Haus Tambaran is divided between two clans. They carve clan and ancestor figures and also make beautiful flutes. An item of this size, form and importance, would have been owned by a village or possibly a clan. Flutes often carry motifs or designs which represent clan totems. Flutes consisted of 2 to 3 meters lengths of bamboo, open at one end and sealed at the other with a flute stopper. Typically there was only one hole in the bamboo tube and the production of notes for the haunting music was achieved by men playing flutes with different lengths at the same time.

Below is an example of another large scarce flute stopper. On theleft, a bird effigy from the Yamuk village, Latmul group, Middle Sepik River, Papua New Guinea which was used as a stopper on one end of a 10 foot bamboo ceremonial flute. On the right, a complete flute with handcarved and handpainted (with natural pigments) bird and human face stopper mounted on its bamboo tube."

Music of Melanesia

"Our knowledge of Melanesian music stems primarily from a few early twentieth-century German studies in the Caroline Islands plus isolated German and American efforts before and after World War 2. These materials reveal a predominantly vocal tradition which emphasizes the heightened speech or the litany chant styles. Many of the Melanesian dances are sitting dances - people perform sitting down with much of the movement emanating from the upper body. The island choreography is principally the movement of the arms, which is very different from Africa which is movement of the feet - you rarely see a sitting-down dance there. The ancestral relationship between East Africa and Melanesia is manifested in that much of the music in Papua New Guinea is performed standing, not sitting.

When it happens, harmony may be based on any interval, though movement in parallel fourths or the use of a drone are the most common. Most singing is integrated with gesture, whether the music be a lament, an invocation, or a serenade. A great deal of the music is used to accompany dance.

Melanesia has the widest diversity of instruments in the region - all types of drums, slit-log gongs, a great variety of flutes and pipes - but no stringed instruments apart from the guitar and ukelele brought in by the Europeans.

As you head east into Polynesia, the Melanesian flutes disappear and the instruments become more sparse, but the passion of the music becomes greater - particular the harmonic content which comes straight from the heart. The "gospel choirs" of Tahiti are particularly astonishing. Music is a reflection of topography and people reflect the landscape they are living in. It is must be remembered that these people came to these islands by canoe and only carried what they needed to make the voyage. When they arrived at their destination, there often were no wood or material to make instruments. The canoes were considered sacred, so no effort was made to break them up to make a musical instrument. Broadly speaking, the highland people have more instruments because they have more wood and accessto other raw materials. The atoll people have shells and coconut trees to make instruments. The island people have traditionally few instruments because they didn't carry them in their canoes."