I’ve been listening to Ba-Benzele Pygmy music lately. It’s crazy complex: multiple time signatures/melodies at the same time. They live in the equatorial forest in Africa, are mostly hunter gatherers and are known for their distinctive vocal music, which involves a complex type of dense contrapuntal communal improvisation based on four voices, and mastered by all members of the community. Here is a link to some of their music: ba-benzele pygmies Some interesting facts about their music: -The level of polyphonic complexity of pygmy music was reached in Europe in the 14th century, yet Pygmy culture is unwritten and ancient. -Their music consists of up to four parts and can be described as an "ostinato with variations" similar to a passacaglia in that it is cyclical. It is based on repetition of periods of equal length that each singer divides using different rhythmic figures specific to different repertoires and songs. This creates a detailed surface and endless variations not only of the same period repeated but of various performances of the same piece of music. As in some Balinese gamelan music, these patterns are based on a super-pattern which is never heard. The Pygmies themselves do not learn or think of their music in this theoretical framework, but learn the music growing up. -Hindewhu is a style of singing/whistle-playing of the BaBenzélé pygmies of the Central African Republic. The word is an onomatopoeia of the sound of a performer alternately singing pitched syllables and blowing into a single-pitch papaya-stem whistle. Hindewhu announces the return from a hunt and is performed solo, duo or in groups. -Water drumming (Liquindi) is produced by persons standing in water, and hitting the surface of the water with their hands, such as to trap air in the hands and produce a percussive effect that arises by sudden change in air pressure of the trapped air. The sound cannot exist entirely in water, since it requires the air-water boundary as a surface to be struck, so the sound is not hydraulophonic.
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