AFRICAN MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS

Enanga

AN arched harp from the Democratic Republic of the Congo

The ennanga, nanga or enanga is a type of arched harp played by the Ganda people ofUganda. The sound
box is made of a single piece of wood and roughly hemispherical. The top of the box is a stretched resonant
membrane made of antelope skin, tied to a piece of hide at the bottom of the box. The neck is attached to the
inside of the box, exits through a small round opening on the membrane, and curves upward for about 60 to 70
cm. Seven or eight strings are attached to a piece of wood inside the box, and extend through the skin to tuning
pegs inserted along the neck. Sometimes small metallic rattling pieces are attached to the pegs, to color the
sound. It is usually used to accompany men's singing.
[edit]Kundi

Ancient Egyptian harp in the British Museum

The kundi is the five-string harp of the Azandeand related people of Central Africa. It is an instrument
traditionally played by young men and boys.[1] A similar type of harp played by theNzakara people. The

instruments are well known for their ornately-carved heads. The instrument has generally fallen from
popularity, though in 1993 some older players were recorded on the album Music from the Bandia Courts.[2]
[edit]References
Luo orutu
Luo orutu, or simply "orutu",[1] is the one-stringed fiddle[1] of East Africa.[2] It is typically accompanied
by Nyatiti lyre, Bul drums, the Nyangile sound box, Ongeng'o metal rings, Asili flute, and the Oporo
horn.[1]
Gongey
Gonjey music is found amongst the Dagomba people of Northern Ghana, which is in West Africa[3] and
is known to the West through modern proponents such as Kenge Kenge[4] and the ethnomusicological
archival activities of Nana Kimati Dinizulu, son of the late Nana Opare Dinizulu. According to
published archival footage Talensi people who are located in the Upper Eastern Region of Ghana and
in Burkina Faso. The gonje is constructed from "a gourd, lizard skin, stick and... a horsehair bow"[5]
"Fiddle tube"
The so-called "fiddle tube" of Uganda is also referred to as "endingidi"
In African music, the calabash is a percussion instrument, of the family of idiophones, consisting of a dried half
calabash, of large size, that is struck with the palms, fingers, wrist or objects to produce a variety of percussive
sounds. This instrument is used in traditional dances.
An erikundi is a kind of basket woven maraca, a percussion instrument.[where?] It is of African origins.
A lamellophone (also lamellaphone or linguaphone, from the Latin root 'lingua' meaning "tongue", i.e., a long
thin plate that is fixed only at one end) is any of a family of musical instruments. The name comes from
the Latin word "lamella" for "plate" and the Greek root "phonos" for "sound". The name derives from the way
the sound is produced: the instrument has a series of thin plates, or "tongues", each of which is fixed at one end
and has the other end free. When the musician depresses the free end of a plate with a finger or fingernail, and
then allows the finger to slip off, the released plate vibrates.
Lamellophones are categorised as 12 in the Hornbostel-Sachs system.
[edit]African lamellophones
Main article: Thumb piano

A Kouxian, played by plucking the ends in front of the oral cavity. The lamella resonate to produce sound.
A large number of lamellophones originate in Africa, where they are known under different names
including mbira, sanza, kisanji, likembe, kalimba, and kongoma. They play an important role in
southeast African Music. They were reported as early as the 16th century, but there is no doubt they have a
much longer history. The Caribbean marmbula is also of this family. The marmbula can be seen as a bass
variant of the mbira and is sometimes used in hiphopmusic.[citation needed]
The tongues may be arranged in the manner of a piano and may be made small enough to play with individual
fingers, hence the colloquial name "thumb piano." (Although some instruments, like the Mbira, have an
additional rows of tongues, in which case not just the thumbs are used for plucking.)[citation needed]
Some conjecture that African lamellophones were derived from xylophones and marimbas. However, similar
instruments have been found elsewhere; for example, the indigenous peoples ofSiberia play wooden and
metallic lamellophones with a single tongue.[citation needed]
Lamellophones may be made with or without resonators. There are also electric lamellophones with an
additional pickup.

Whale Drum with 8 tongues (from Emil Richards Collection)

[edit]Schaeffner's classification
Schaeffner's musical instrument classification scheme has a post-prominent place for the linguaphones
(lamellophones) at the second highest level of classification.
In 1932, Andre Schaeffner developed a new classification scheme that was "exhaustive, potentially covering all
real and conceivable instruments" [Kartomi, p.176]. Schaeffner's system has only two top-level categories
denoted by Roman numerals (Schaeffner, A.:Origine des instruments de musique, pp. 371-377.):

I: instruments that make sound from vibrating solids;

IA Solids not susceptibles of tension (equivalent to a big part of Hornbostel & Sachsidiophones);

IB Flexible solids (equivalent to mainly linguaphones);

IC Tensionable solids (equivalent to both membranophones and chordophones);

II: instruments that make sound from vibrating air (aerophones).

[edit]List of lamellophones

Agidigbo

Array mbira

Chisanza

Comb

Dan moi

Electric thumb piano

Eleke

Frankophone

Ikembe

Jaw harp, Jews Harp

Kaffir piano

Kalimba

Kalimbe

Kasayi

Kisanji

Kouxian

Lujon (musical instrument)

Likembe

Lukembe

Malimbe

Marmbula

Marmbula - Caribbean thumb piano

Mbira

Morsing

Mechanical music box

Oopoochawa

Sansa

Sanza

Space Harp

Teponaztli

Thumb piano

Tom (instrument)

Tongue drum

Whale Drum

Zanza

Zanzu

In African music, the mbira (also known as likembe, mbila, thumb

piano, mbira huru, mbira njari, mbira nyunga
nyunga, sansu, zanzu, karimbao, kalimba, or-between the late 1960s
and early 1970s-sanza) is a musical instrument that consists of a wooden
board to which staggered metal keys have been attached. It is often fitted
into a resonator. In Eastern and Southern Africa, there are many kinds of
mbira, usually accompanied by the hosho. Among the Shona people there
are three that are very popular (see Shona music). The mbira is usually
classified as part of the lamellaphonefamily. It is also part of
the idiophones family of musical instruments.

Both Dr. Joseph H. Howard, owner of the largest collection of drums and ancillary folk instruments in the
Americas, and Nigerian drummer Babatunde Olatunji argue that the mbira is thoroughly African, being found
only in areas populated by Africans or their descendants.[1]

In Shona music, the mbira dzavadzimu ("voice of the ancestors", national instrument of Zimbabwe[2]) is a
musical instrument that has been played by the Shona people ofZimbabwe for thousands of years. The mbira
dzavadzimu is frequently played at religious ceremonies and social gatherings called mabira (sing. "bira").
A typical mbira dzavadzimu consists of between 22 and 28 keys constructed from hot- or cold-forged metal
affixed to a hardwood soundboard (gwariva) in three different registerstwo on the left, one on the right.
While playing, the little finger of the right hand is placed through a hole in the bottom right corner of the
soundboard, stabilizing the instrument and leaving thumb and index finger of the right hand open to stroke the
keys in the right register from above and below. The fingers of the left hand stabilize the left side of the
instrument, with most fingers reaching behind the instrument. Both registers on the left side of the instrument
are played with the left thumb and sometimes the left forefinger.
Bottle caps, shells, or other objects ("machachara"[3]) are often affixed to the soundboard to create a buzzing
sound when the instrument is played. In a traditional setting, this sound is considered extremely important, as it
is believed to attract the ancestral spirits.
During a public performance, an mbira dzavadzimu is frequently placed in a deze (calabashresonator) to amplify
its sound.
The mbira dza vadzimu is very significant in Shona religion and culture, considered a sacred instrument by
natives. It is usually played to facilitate communication with ancestral spirits. Within the Shona tradition, the
mbira may be played with paired performers in which thekushaura, the caller, leads the performed piece as
the kutsinhira, the responder, "interlocks" a subsequent part.[4]
The Ritual is known as the Bira. During these all night ceremonies, people call upon the spirits to answer
questions, the variations of notes in an Mbira piece aid the participants by going into a trance in which it is said
in shona culture aid the spirits in taking over the participants body

A rock gong is a lithophone. Found in Africa, Asia, and Europe, the gong is a
slab of rock that is hit like a drum.[1] Other regional names for the rock gong
include kungering,[2]kwerent dutse, gwangalan, kungereng, kongworian,
and kuge.[3] These names are allonomatopic, except for "kuge" which is
the Hausa word for a double iron bell[3] and "dawal" which is the Ge`ez word
for a church's stone gong.

A slit drum is a hollow percussion instrument. In spite of the name, it is not a true drum but an idiophone,
usually carved or constructed from bamboo or wood into a box with one or more slits in the top. Most slit drums
have one slit, though two and three slits (cut into the shape of an "H") occur. If the resultant tongues are
different width or thicknesses, the drum will produce two different pitches. It is used
throughout Africa, Southeast Asia, andOceania. In Africa such drums, strategically situated for optimal acoustic
transmission (e.g., along a river or valley), have been used for long-distance communication.

List of slit drums

Agung a Tamlang (Philippine) - Maguindanaon

Alimba - Zairean

Ekwe - Igbo

Huiringua - Mexico

Kagul (Philippine) - Maguindanaon

Krin or Kolokolos - Guinea

Lokole - Congo Basin

Mondo - West Africa

Mukoku - Yaka people (Congo)

Pate - Samoa, Cook Islands, and other parts of Polynesia

Tagutok (Philippine) - Maranao

Teponaztli - Mesoamerican

Tongue drum

Vanuatuan slit drum - Vanuatu

The Zeze is a stringed instrument from Sub-Saharan Africa. It is also known by the names Tzetze and Dzendze,
and on Madagascar is called Lokanga Voatavo or Lokango Voatavo.
It has 1 or 2 strings. The strings are made of steel or Bicycle brake wire.

AFRICAN
MUSICAL
INSTRUMENTS
SUBMITTED TO:
Sir Jay U. Sargento
SUBMITTED BY:
Jamaica Marie M. Tumulak
Third Year - St. Gregory

Ryan Derick P. Esquivel

African Musical instruments
The following are some of the African musical instruments used
throughout the continent, primarily Sub-Saharan...
Membranophones (Drums):
cylindrical, semi-cylindrical, barrel, hourglass, pressure, goblet,
kettle, clay-pot
Djembe, West Africa
Chordophones (Stringed instruments):
harps (koras), musical bows, fiddles, lyres, zithers, lutes
Aerophones (Wind instruments):
flutes: bamboo, millet, reed, animal horn tips, gourds
trumpets: wood, gourd, metal tubes pipes; single, double reed,
panpipes
horns: tusks and animal horns
Idiophones (Resonant solids):
mbira, xylophone and lamellophone rattles and shakers: gourds,
woven, wooden, stick
bells: ankle, cluster, double, single, pod, tubular, clapperless
Percussion:
rainsticks, woodsticks, clapsticks bells, rattles, slit gongs, struck
gourds and claypots, stamping tubes
body: foot stamping and hand clapping