African Dancing and Drumming

Title:  "Zehil" and "Rugaro nekutamba"

Performer:  Etienne Cakpo, Laura Lue Chiorah (choreographer), Dance This dance intensive program, musical performers are unknown

Culture/Origin:  mixture of African countries

Orchestration:  African drum ensemble

I went looking for African dance because I remembered the reading on resources that can be used.  This includes bringing in other people who are experts in the field.  This dance is not an "authentic" dance of a particular African country, but a mixture of groups.  This is what I am lead to believe by the description, anyway.  (I tried looking into it on other sites, but found no such luck.)  In high school I remember going to about three different workshops on either African dance or drumming, so the idea of bringing culture bearers into the classroom is one that I can easily relate to.  Through Feierabend technique we are trained to teach our students folk dances, which we could say at this point in time is from a different culture.  Allowing our students the freedom to dance in an African style will help them open their mind to different types of dance and ways of expressing themselves through music.  

Bulgarian Singing

Title:  Malka Moma
Performers:  Neli Andreeva and Choir Filip Kutev
Culture/Origin:  Malka Moma is a folk song and this particular recording was arranged by Georgi Genov and is about a young girl saying a prayer.
Instrumentation:  There is a choir arrangement with a soloist that is singing the whole time

The discussion in class last week about forward singing and the aural art of the traditional Bulgarian singing had me intrigued.  The soloist, Neli Andreeva, sings with very forward vowels, while the chorus in the background seems to sing with more round vowels.  This helps her voice to cut past the choir, even toward the end of the piece, when there is a crescendo in all parts.  She seems to sharpen her vowels even more toward the end, but they are always very forward in general.  Something else that is more particular about this piece is the amount of melismas.  The singing is very smooth through the melismas and they seem to be more of embellishments of notes than part of the melody itself.  As I was looking for a piece, I thought it would be hard to appreciate the sound more than it was.  This piece is beautiful and very moving to listen to.