Musical instruments in Zambia: familiarity

Musical instruments in Zambia: familiarity. Especially with respect to local cultures, many assume implicitly that everybody in that culture knows everything about that culture. Like every other ‘local culture’, Chibale is a case against this implicit assumption. There are many cases on this site that indicate its inaccuracy. This includes familiarity with musical instruments and familiarity with musical genres among the ‘general public’. Chibale is a relatively small area, which most of the inhabitants consider to be a single, that is Lala, culture, with many musical occasions. Still, less than 50% of all musical instruments are generally known.¹‘All’ meaning: all musical instruments still there and still remembered.

In the surveys of 1985/86, 1987 and 2004, the participants were asked to mention as many musical instruments as they could. When they could not mention another instrument, the interviewer read the instruments not mentioned one by one from a list. Then, the people indicated whether they recognised them as a musical instrument. The assumption was that the instruments not mentioned nor recognised were unknown to the one interviewed.

Familiarity of musical instruments/instrument names

See List 5.

We see that in 2004 17 instruments are known by almost everyone. These are the instruments still used frequently. Yet, though they are played rarely, the lupenga, the mankubala, the kazoos and the kankobele are known by more than half. Hunters and boys still use the first and third, be it rarely. And, the second and fourth are considered to underline local identity. The remaining 16 instruments are known to ever smaller numbers of people.

In the 1980s, many of the instruments mentioned were true instruments. Some people did not consider a certain instrument to be a musical instrument and therefore did not mention or recognise it. This influenced the scores somewhat. See the article about true instruments. Another, smaller, influence was that some of the ones interviewed, especially some of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, did not want to come across as connoisseurs of Chibale music. Both influences were almost absent in the survey of 2004.

Changes in familiarity over the years

Musical instruments in Zambia: familiarity. The differences between the 1980s surveys and that of 2004 amount to the following.
People mention well-known instruments more often (instead of only recognise) in 2004. The reason will be that the influence of the idea of true instruments is much smaller: other than true instruments are mentioned and recognised much more. The musical instruments that were less known in the 1980s are even less, but still, known in the 2000s.

The area opened up in the period between the first two and the third surveys and saw a large growth in christianity and more wealth (less poverty). Still, the familiarity with musical instruments did not change very much. The concept of what a musical instrument is shows a change in orientation: from particular attention to instruments that are worth evaluating to all musical sound producing instruments.