Characteristics of African Music

Timeline

Wood block, bell, triangle. Gauge internally, not unlike a time signature.

Cross Rhythm

Improvisation

Hocket Technique

Ululation

The use of musical instruments for verbal communication

Close relationship between melody and spoken line

Love of rattle sound

Use of nonsense syllables

Open minded attitude to sound

Chants and Recitatives

Chants: Spoken chants, no exact tune or melody to it.

Recitative: Sung speech—takes spoken speech like rhythms to more melodic

Extensive use of idiophones

idiophones are instruments that create sounds/vibration through themselves — not via strings or membranes (like drums). examples include wood blocks, triangles, marimba, gong, maracas,)

Hand clapping

in african music, you might hear people clapping their hands

cues by performers (instrumentalists, dancers)

Scales: Pentatonic, Hexatonic, Heptatonic etc.

Can be many types of scales in songs

Call and Response/overlapping

When a voice or instrument starts, and another “responds” back.

overlapping is when the call/response starts as the other still goes