Songs and dances classification
Songs and dances in Zambia: classification
People use classifications based on characteristics, groups, and genre names side-by-side. Classification depends on who starts the song and whether the song is light or heavy.
Songs and dances in Zambia: classification categories
To refer to a song, often the one they have just sung or heard, people mention certain characteristics of the song or they use a name.
Characteristics are the occasion(s) at which the song is typically used, the purpose for which it is used, or to the purport of its text. The names refer to the dance type that goes with the song or to the composer/origin of the song. In both latter cases there also is a connection with occasions.
Songs and dances in Zambia: classification by specialists
Quotations of the ones who contributed to the overview of older song genres. These illustrate several of the salient features of Chibale song classification.
Songs and dances in Zambia: owner of the song
What appear to be the ‘same’ songs can be classified differently depending on the status of the one starting it. For the repertoire deriving from Chibale or more generally from the Kaonde-Lamba-Lenje-Lala region, a distinction is made between songs brought by mediums, (non-possessed) specialists and laypeople.
The effect of the performance of the three types of performers is different and since effect (purpose) is the most important criterion for song classification, the three situations lead to different classifications.
Songs and dances in Zambia: the root melody
The songs within one root melody have the same length and are similar in the contour of the melody, in the ratio note repetitions : steps : leaps, in the number of syllables used and in rhythmic density. They are not similar in text, apart from a few words, like a name or exhortation, that occurs in every realisation of that root melody.
Songs and dances in Zambia: extension of the repertoire
How can the repertoire be extended? What is a new song and does it exist? How are songs classified that one has never heard before?
Songs and dances in Zambia: different or the same
When are two songs called different or the same, and why?