There is something immediately compelling about drumming in the night. Perhaps it’s the stark contrast, the deep thumps resounding through the otherwise hushed darkness. The sound is fueled by the fires of exoticism, the drums hidden by both the darkness and the night, suggesting something ritualistic, sacred, and above all, secret.

The first time I ventured out to find the source of sound it was not without trepidation. The mere act, to follow barely discernible drums and voices, which in the desert can much further than they appear, requires a willful determination. Staggering over dunes and past an oasis and across a sand river, the sound growing in volume, I came to an old area of the town. Stone husks of houses climbed up and sank into the dune. I walked between the alleys and around the strewn rock, slowly buried in the encroaching sand. Rounding a corner I came upon the frame of an old house. Inside, thirty some men and a handful of women, all “black” Moor, had assembled.

medeh chingeutti

The music of medeh lends a simple description. There are men leading the song, pounding on the tbel, a large round drum fashioned from a bowl with an animal skin drawn across it. The drum produces a low resonating bass, almost too low to hear. The other men begin to clap in a succession of mixing handclaps that build off one another to produce a confusing poly-rhythm. This conflux of drums and claps in contrasting rhythms blend together as one listens. Then, there is the singing – one voice leading in a strained cry to his vocal limits, subsequently answered by the chorus of voices chanting in harmonic response. It is participatory, particularly in the circle closest to that of the drummer. To sit here is to clap and sway with the song, to answer and provoke one another to be present and absorbed.

The medeh is a music performed only by the haratine, the former and modern “slave caste,” in the night and away from the town. The drumming and rhythm are immediately identified as sub-Saharan, and everything in the tradition can be directly traced to the heritage of a captured and marginalized minority. The content of the music is strictly religious, songs for the prophet. Abderramhane Ngaide compares it to “American Gospel and Hatian Vodou.” While it may be marginalized and referred to as “for the blacks,” it is nevertheless a firm tradition, sung and performed every Thursday.

In my last Thursday in Nouakchott I waved down a taxi and directed him to the Hisakane. Hisakane means “the quiet place,” in Hassaniya, and incidentally sits at the side of the international airport. The largest, poorest slum is inhabited by a majority of Black Moor. Every night, a jet streaks overhead filling the air with a roar and a blast of wind. So close, but wholly inaccessible.

After a few minutes meandering the twisting sand streets I heard the low thump of a drum. I don’t speak Hassaniya and none of the Moor who assembled spoke French. A young man from Bassikinou knew some Tamashek however, and invited me to sit to the right of the drummer. Sitting and swaying and clapping, the crowd growing behind us, I never knew quite what was happening.

That night the houses were lit like Chinese lanterns, the bare bulbs filtering through the wide cracks between the slats. I looked for Orion to find my direction, but the city lights of Nouakchott glistened off the dust in the wind to turn the black into a hazy glow.

medeh hisakan

Historically, musicologists lacked the capability to record audio. Songs were transcribed either in Western musical notation or some peculiar form of transcription. Both forms suffered from inevitable selection bias as to what was or was not “recorded” (or able to be recorded in the confines of the transcription method, which may not take into count nuances in rhythm, the force by which a note is struck, etc.) as well as being cumbersome and inaccessible to those not trained in music reading. The advent of recording devices solved these difficulties – enabling the perfect reproduction of the said event, at least in the sonic realm.

While tramping around with a microphone, it is often easy to focus on the music being produced. Sahelian musicians, particularly the modern musicians (here I would note that all “musicians” are “modern”, something distinctly different from a traditional music maker who is often bound to a specific title and role) will gladly perform for a Westerner for a myriad of reasons that should be rather obvious. It can be easy to forgo the other variety of sound that is unique and probably endangered.

The Kel Adrar dialect of Tamasheq, spoken by only around 270,000 people, does not seem to be in danger of disappearing; though certainly much of the rich vocabulary is likely to vanish as the nomads leave the desert and settle into urban centers.* But besides the work of language preservation, there are some other bizarre curiosities of the desert – such as Tinfusain (TIN-foo-sain). A type of story telling, sometimes improvised, it demonstrates to the non-Tamasheq speaker at least the sound of Tamasheq and a distinguishable rhyming meter.

Poetry, Tinfusain

Another of these strange/beautiful things is humming/song/sound. Known as “bel-lu-wel” which I’ve heard as well on some of Francois Borels’ recordings in Niger, it’s explained to me as “something for children”:

Belluwel 1
Belluwel 2

Accompanying the seemingly limitless vocabulary for animals which occupy much of the time of the Kel Adrar (the proverbial Eskimos’ “seven words for snow”) is a menagerie of sounds used to both call and disperse animals:

Goat call
Cow, camel, mutton, donkey (call and disperse)
Calling “kids” to eat acacia

Digging around the old archives of sound recordings, as I’m oft to do, I happened across this nugget. Recorded in 1939 by John and Ruby Lomax, it shows a Texas gentleman demonstrating how to call a hog. Listening to this, I would wonder how pedestrian and common this sound was at one time – and how few Texan inhabitants know this today. The sound probably exists now only in some dusty archive (or some metaphorically corner of the internet). But it’s comforting somehow to know that it exists.

* As well as the written version of the language which uses an ancient script known as Tifinagh. The mostly vowel-less alphabet differs drastically between regions with variations in letters within 100 kilometers. Again, the alphabet is on the verge of extinction due to a Malian ban on teaching it in the schools and inability of Tuareg intellectuals to arrive on a mutually agreeable Tifinagh.

Pen drawing by Ibrahim Zouga (ag.ibrahimdessin@yahoo.fr)

Another routine evening, we assemble inside Ahmed’s compound of chest high mud walls, sitting on the light mats thrown down in the dusty yard. Two or three guitars are picked up and traded around, the flickering light of the fire just barely bright enough to make out the shadowy figures – who all remain relatively silent in the breaks between songs. Silent, except for my persistent questions, which they’ve become accustomed to: “Who wrote that song? What’s that called? Where is that from?”

In the regional musical scene there is a strong surviving folk tradition. While music may occupy a place in recorded and played back form, songs are still learned and collected by traveling musicians. Incidentally, the songs have their own stories – how they were learned, where they were learned, and then the tales of the songs themselves: their creators and the stories behind them. Often tragic, or near tragic, as the musician is forced to leave his craft for love or family, these common themes are as important as the song itself.

The following recordings are from a guitarist known as “Bebe” – a childhood nickname that stuck with him. Like many of the young Tamashek, he spent his youth in exile and his later years traveling about the desert regions of Algeria, Mali, and Libya, in the nouvelle-ishumar existence.

“N ca, n ca, ca ces pour uh, le, ce pour dugah dugah…c’est un noir, dugaduga s’appelle, joue le guitar la les arabes la…abodit…il e fou, le tip que joue le morsel la, il e fue! Il e fue, c’est un fou, mais il joue. Walahi je te jue. Nooo, dugaduga? Il e forte. Il joue bien! Il e son group.”

“And this, and this, this here is for, this is for Dugah Dugah…he’s a black, Duga Duga he’s called, plays the guitar of the Arabs there…abodit…he’s crazy, this guy that plays the song, he’s crazy! He’s crazy, he’s crazy but he plays. I swear to God he plays. Noooo, Duga Duga? He’s strong. He play’s good! Him and his group!”*

bebe – dugaduga

“ishilan an tenere…le jour de la desert. C’est un Tamashek blanc, ver a un Djanet la. Ca pour Oun-tas-ili. Le tip il ya n de Tasili…le fronteir entre Algerie… le morset il e fait seulementil, apres il e laissez le guitar. Il jouer, il lodge a la Sahara. Son pere il ya beacoup de chameaux. Beacoup! Il y ri. Il e dit faux laisse ca, tu e pas un forgeron qui fais ca. Tu e pas un griot. Il y laisse. Il e a Tassili, le guitar c’est fini. Le chameaux. A dit ah, comme il s’appelle? Le gen que…le mutton. Le mutton tak tagila. A cote…il dor, il son fatigue! C’est ca il e dit. Son fatigue. Le gen des animaux, tak tagila.”

“Ishilan an Tenere…the day of the desert. He’s a white Tamashek, near Djanet there. This for Oun-Tas-ili. The guy he’s from Tasili…the border between Algeria…the song he just made, afterwards he left the guitar. He playes, he lived in the Sahara. He’s father has lots of camels. Lots! He’s rich. He (his father) said, leave this, you’re not a blacksmith that does this. Your not a griot. He left. He’s in Tassili, the guitar is done. The camels. A said…what’s it called? The people that….the sheep. The sheep tak tagila. Next to…he sleeps, he’s tired. That’s what he says. They’re tired! The people of the animals, tak tagila.”

bebe – ishilan an tenere

“Ca. Ca c’est pour un group avant Algerie. Avant!” “Ces temp ne pas des artists beacoup. Maintentant le tipe joue pas guitar, c’est fini. Il a marrie. S’appelle Salah bin Omar. Ca ces un Tamashek noir de Algerie. Il e marrie, e les gen, le pere de femme, il y dit laisse joue. Tu vais marrie la fille. Il e laissez de jouer, il y marrie la fille la. Il joue pas maintenant. Il entren les enfants le guitar seulemente. Donne le cour de guitar, mais il jouer pas.”

“This. This is for a group before Algeria. Before! This time there wasn’t a lot of artists. Now this guy doesn’t play guitar, it’s over. He’s married. He’s called Salah bin Omar. This is a black Tamashek from Algeria. He married, the people, the father of the women, he said to leave playing. You’re going to marry the girl. He left playing, he married the girl there. He doesn’t play now. He teaches the guitar only. Gives the guitar course, but he doesn’t play.”

bebe – transcribed text

bebe – salah bin omar

*The transcriptions demonstrate how this “folk” data is recorded, and the ensuing difficulties of a mutually second language (French transcribed in most appropriate phonetic manner, and direct English translation).

Teyti anounces isswat

In the rainy season, pooled water gathers and flows into seasonal rivers. They follow the same paths, snaking deep gulleys carved into the hard earth from the many years. The area around these gullies is flourishing with trees. Craggy vicious trees with spines, but relative to the plain desert it is rather like a forest. With the first rains, parents warn their children to stay clear of the gullies – the small trickles will grow into torrents of mud and sticks. And the head of the stream is often preceded by tumbling snakes.

Teyti, Aki, and Towti

Maroniya and Sele

It’s here in the forest amongst the pools that the families gather for the rains. Most of the year they live in small family units, a few tents of extended family, far from neighbors to maximize the yield, grazing their animals on the besieged and sparse vegetation. Thus, with the rains, a surplus of water and food, the animals giving abundance of milk, the families coming together is a moment of relaxation and celebration.

Isswat is an activity relegated to the night. After the stars have come out, the families have finished dinner, the youth sneak off. Perhaps one will begin playing a tende. The other young and unmarried youth will hear this, the distant low pounding of the drum. Sneaking off to some locale away from the camp, the youth assemble.

The music of the issawat is characterized by the sigadah, the low humming of the men, which provides a bass, and the woman who will sing the melody. The songs are often provocative, songs of love, albeit it in a very coy and covert manner. Issawat is also the opportunity for the youth to meet and flirt, and in the periphery of the performance, the young boys and girls whisper to one another.

Hoymada as performed by Halima Walet Mohamed, Kidal, Mali

More

Issawat is not merely the music, but the name given for the activity. In general, the music is a type of non instrumental symphony, where one singer leads with a melody and the others sing a bass, accompanied by clapping, stomping, or drum playing. There are similar types of music found that share these traits, such as “el medh” (previously) in Mauritania, or that “isswat” of the Sonrai.

Recordings of Isswat as performed in Bourem

More

I once heard a story about the family in Djounhan. Tigadahasit’s older brother once fell in love with a girl from another camp. She had come to Ijuhrer for the rains, but staying far across the forested plain. Realizing the brevity of the season and the possibility that another suitor would arrive in his absence, he was determined to arrive every night for the issawat. Late at night, and dressed in the finest clothes, he would walk out into the dark. At every flooded gully, he would disrobe and wade through the dark mud, carrying his clothing above his head, dressing on the other side, just until he arrived. Here, he would rest until the early morning, the long journey home under the lightening sky.

Imagine the brousse like a rich tapestry laid out over the desert. This is not the empty desert of bleached sand, the “tilemsi” as it is called in Tamashek, not the vast stretch wasteland where no plant grows, not the sea of alternating sand dunes and lush green date palm oases. The desert is not even called desert by the inhabitants, but “brousse” (or bush). It is an area where grass abounds in after the rains, where spindly trees disguise the tents, where craggy rock mountains peak over the horizon.

The brousse is thickly inhabited. Each section has a name and a history. The people are mobile, like all nomads, but not overly so. There’s water in the rainy season, and forgiving the years of drought, enough pasturage to support goats, mutton, and cows.

One of the trees that one associates with the brousse is the acacia (“tamat”), a thin twisty tree of numerous white nail-like spines. The tree also bears litte yellow flowers that are fed to the young goats. The sap, tinhoost, is picked off in the dry season and eaten like candy. The root of the acacia is used to make the Tamashek flute. The difficult part is finding a section of straight root. The piece is placed into the sand over which a fire has been blazing. The heat seperates the outside bark from the center wood, and after substantial twisting, the outer layer of wood is pulled free. Holes are cut along the shaft. The inner wood is reserved to store the flute, which is quite fragile, being only the outer bark of root.

The Tamashek flute is known as the “ta-kha-nit”. It’s a transverse flute, similar to the flute found in Mauritania and Senegal (and across the Sahel). Traditionally the flute is associated with herders – those with an ample amount of time, tramping around the brousse with their sheep and goats. Today it is still a common brousse instrument, something to play with friends in the evening.

Harim Batem

“This is a song for a man named Harim Batem – it’s a type of song called “tar-li-lit”, a type of praising poetry made in honor of someone. Harim Batem was a man from a long time ago. He was a ‘broussiere’, not a warrior. It’s not always war here. He was someone who was strong and brave, he could do any type of work assigned to him. He was popular with the women…well, it’s the women who write the poetry after all…”

Tahalun tahsun

“This is a song that tells the story of a herder who went out the pasture, and one of his cows had an accident and broke his leg. All the cows left, but the other cow remained, trying to limp along to follow the others home. Sometimes the music is fast, then slow, and sometimes it stops. This is the creation of the song, the story of the cow.”

Yerodi

The flute is made from the desert. And it invites one to imagine the low wistful hum as the brousse itself, the wind whistling through the acacia. In the evening at the camp in Djounhan, not an hours travel from Kidal ville but already a world apart, the sun is setting. The children gather the animals, tying up the young camels. The girls wander amongst the trees, looking for firewood. The sun descends into the band of dusty horizon and a cool wind blows.

Sunset at camp

The guitar soiree is the quintessential to the modern Tamashek. At least a few times in a week a festival will be organized — be it a marriage, a baptism, or simply a concert. As the first stars appear in the sky, the guitar can be heard wafting over the city. “Listen…” heads tilt, to ascertain the sound. “Radio? No, definitely guitar…”

The guests, the women in glittering shawls, the young men in new turbans and sporting leather jackets assemble on the ornate rugs on opposing sides. In the center lies a section a few meters squared. This is the dance floor. The first group is announced over the microphone to come forward as the band strikes a few chords, and groups of men rush forward. There is usually disagreement, as six young men stubbornly claim their place. “Three people only, please,” the announcer begs. The band waits patiently for concession. “Merci,” the announcer sighs, and the music begins. There is some bustle in the crowd of women before a few jump up. The dance is a simple two step from side to side, although it occurs on a counter beat, and the dancers dance in place, facing one another yet separated by a good meter, moving their arms about in striking poses. At some point in the song, the refrain, both sides step forward and and dance close to one another, before passing and changing sides on the square. The music ends, the six dancers rush back to their places.

Group Amanar at a small concert in Essouk.
(myspace link)

The guitar soiree is the forum for Tamashek guitar music. It’s rather non participatory — after all, everyone wants to dance — but it is just as much an opportunity to be seen. The first guitar soirees came in the 1990s. Prior to that the guitar cassettes were more likely to be heard blaring throughout the speakers in Libyan military camps.

In some ways, the precedent of the guitar could be seen as the tahardint, the traditional guitar, and the takamba. The takamba is a style of tahardint with a distinctive rhythm pounded on a calabas. It is a fast sound and paradoxically a painfully slow dance. The format of the soirees are similar, but the dancing is slower, ghostly, and more eloquent.

Takamba from Ali Ag Moman, Timbouctou.

Yet the music that probably comes closest to the guitar is iswatt. Iswatt incidentally is a non instrumental music. The sound is created by a rhythmic clapping accompanied by foot stomping, a constant low frequency male humming and grunts, and a female singing (“the five instruments of iswatt,” a friend proclaims). The crowd forms a circle and pairs of dancers enter amidst the energetic hand clapping. The dancing is fast, arms flailing, dust raising, and with billowing robes. The dancers drop to the ground and jump into the air.

If the guitar is the music of ville, isawatt, even today, continues to be a music of the brousse. In the rainy season, a few people will sneak away into the darkness, far away from the tents and begin singing. The others will hear and come together, following the echoes through the dark night. In that way at least, things are not so different. Well – maybe a little. As the Tamashek saying regarding issawat “Sin, Sin, Keratd Warhein” translates: “Two by Two, Three is Sick”. Or in other words, “two pairs at a time.”

Iswatt “demonstration” by children en brousse.

On a near moonless night, the bus rumbles to a halt. The passengers all debark along the side of the road — a vast clear plain clouded in by the shadows of the Dogon cliffs — somewhere on the national highway between Douentza and Hombori. As all the weary passengers sit, they all are pulling out cellphones, and soon the mass is illuminated by little square blue screens. There is no cellular phone reception here — this is not important. They are not making calls. Rather, what ensues is an orchestra of tinny digital audio, a menagerie of sound, beamed out like starlight over the plain.

Douentza recording

The cellular phone in its current incarnation is a recent phenomena here, but one with sweeping effects. In the past few years, the market was flooded with cheaply designed Chinese cellphones (bearing names like Samsong or Sqny), equipped with memory cards and featuring Video, Photo, and Audio, as well as Bluetooth wireless transfer. The ability to make calls is rather superfluous, and they are likely distributed in villages that have no cellular access whatsoever.

Interview with Amadou, chaffeur

One of the repercussions is the death of the cassette. For a long time, the cassette has held sway as the primary audio device in the Sahel and Sahara. While vinyl was popular in the capitals, in the radio stations, it never gained mass distribution — the simple environmental considerations would render it useless after a single hot season. As are CDs, quickly destroyed by the degenerative effects of dust and sand. The hardy cassette was the chosen media for the desert. But now, it seems they are breathing their last breath. Original cassettes are plummeting. While pirate cassette vendors are still a mainstay in every market, their compilations are not recorded from studio produced originals, but dubbed from mp3 to tape recorders.

Interview with Mouda Maiga, cassette vendor

The amateur recordings on cellphones are the envy of any ethnomusicologist — Tamashek poetry, tende drumming, multiphonic issawat chanting. All, in fact, done without the chasm the foreigner, an outsider whose motives are questioned and ability to understand hampered by culture and language. The ethnomusicologist cannot ignore the effect of the cellular phone, nor the utility that it plays in research.

Interview regarding the Christian Tamashek guitar of Pastor Mohammed, from Timbouctou, conducted over cellular phone recording.

The new media places the technology in the hands of the Africans. And as such, questions the role of the intrepid collector, the documentary filmmaker, the anthropologist, the photographer. The foreigner who has descended onto the continent over the past centuries has benefited from the technological inequity to become the voice, the conduit. Like the cassette, his days are numbered.

‘Mashup’ of assorted music collected from cellphones in Gao and Kidal.