The set-up of the surveys

Considering the arguments presented in the literature of the 1980s, I adopted two practicable techniques for quantitative data collection in audience research for Survey 1985/86 and Survey 1987¹Later they were combined in Survey 2004)..

• Respondents were asked to mention the genres they preferred (and disliked), provide examples of these genres, and to give the reasons for each preference (and dislike).
• Respondents were asked to value-score or rate music examples of genres or styles played for them, provide examples of similar music, and give the reasons for each score or rating.

With both techniques, it was necessary to consider the correspondence between the survey form and the forms of musical evaluation common in the research area, and the representativeness of the music examples used. Furthermore, many more questions were asked than the two mentioned above for each technique, such as about the feelings experienced while hearing the song or whether it contained mistakes. See the questionnaires of the surveys.

The set-up and the way of performing the surveys

Survey 1985/86

During the interviews of 259 people over fourteen years of age, a list of questions was used about musical preferences and a number of other issues. The survey was held when I had been in the Chibale for six months in total, during a period of reduced agricultural activity.

The survey area was equal to the research area. The population surveyed formed around 4.5% of the total population at that time. Care was taken that the survey population contained groups of more or less comparable size as to sex, age, and place of residence within the research area.

The interviewing was done by young men from Chibale who had just finished secondary school. No women were willing to do interviews. The questionnaires were translated into ciLala, and every interviewer did some test interviews, not only for himself to get used to it but also to reformulate questions that turned out to be difficult for the respondents. The interviewers wrote down the answers to the questions in English if they had already been given before or in ciLala if they were new or in any other sense divergent. Go to the 1985/86 questionnaire.

During the survey, we daily discussed how things were proceeding. It was necessary to keep a close watch on the way the interviewers handled the open questions. They were expected not to be content with each answer given. Some respondents tended to give informationless, ambiguous, or evasive answers, for instance, “I prefer Katumpa as a dancer because she dances so well”. Another problem discussed in these sessions was that of the differences in age, status, or sex between the interviewers and many of the respondents. Also discussed was how to accustom the respondent as much as possible to the interview situation.

The average length of the interview was a little more than two hours, which was near to the maximum time respondents could keep their focus. The respondents received a present of salt, sugar, or soap after the interview, equal to the payment for half a day’s work.

The non-response bias of the survey was small. Only in a few cases did someone refuse to be interviewed. In two cases, a respondent stopped the interview before it was finished. A number of Jehovah’s Witnesses among the respondents, approximately a third, answered questions about spirit-possession only reluctantly, or refused to answer. To minimise the effects of this, questions pertaining to possession were asked at the end of the interview.

Survey 1987

During the interviews of 146 people over fourteen years of age, the respondents listened with headphones to nine songs played on a cassette-recorder. Of each song, the first 60 to 80 seconds were played. After each song, the same list of questions was gone through. Go to the 1987 questionnaire.

Because of limited time available, the survey was done during a busy period, so most interviewing had to take place in the afternoon. As to the personal data and musical knowledge, the survey was almost the same as Survey 1985/86. A short section was added to obtain information about the respondents’ views on the similarities and dissimilarities between seven well-known musical instruments and between six well-known song types.

The main part of this survey was the section where nine songs were played for the respondent. After each song, the same questions were asked. These were questions for a value score, the reason for that score and the feelings experienced while hearing the song. As to song text interpretation, the respondents were asked what they considered to be the message or main subject of the song, followed by a detailed question about the text of that specific song. From the reasons for preferences as collected in Survey 1985/86 six main types of reasons for preferring a song were deduced. It was checked whether the respondent found one of these applicable or not applicable to the song in question. Then followed short questions about the song type, the occasion at which it was normally sung, the performer(s), possible mistakes in the performance, the energy (maka) in the performance, whether the song was related to one of the sexes or not, whether it was typically Lala or not, whether it belonged to the fast, light, or the heavy type of songs, and lastly whether the song could be used for kupupa.

I had planned to play twelve songs for each respondent. These songs were recorded on four cassette tapes to be used by the four young men who would do the interviews. After some tests, twelve songs turned out to be too demanding, because the time necessary to go through the list of questions after each song was longer than expected. So I decided to reduce the number of songs to nine. Since I had only one recorder with me, I was not able to reorder the twelve songs and decided to drop the last three songs. This was to avoid the interviewers having to search the beginning of the next recording when skipping one. This was not only impracticable because the cassette players used headphones, but it also interrupted the interviews. Another option would have been to have the interviewer play songs 1 to 9 for one informant and songs 4 to 12 for the other or any other such sequences. However, this would have reduced the number of respondents for songs 1, 2, 3, 10, 11 and 12 to a low 50 (at that stage, I was expecting some 100 respondents). So eventually, the last three songs were simply dropped: a song with kalimba (lamellaphone) accompaniment, a hymn of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, and a song by the choir of the UCZ church in Chibale village. It was especially unfortunate that no christian song was present among the songs played, because this was an important song type.

Survey 2004

The interviews of 138 people over fourteen years of age were composed of parts of the interviews of the surveys of 1985/86 and of 1987, with seven other songs to listen to and comment upon. Go to the 2004 questionnaire.