Songs and dances in Zambia: fwandafwanda

Songs and dances in Zambia: fwandafwanda. Fwandafwanda, or fwandaula, is a social dance that came up in Chibale, around 1950. Other names are cindanga or, sometimes, kapoya or nyimbo shakwaMubanga (songs from Mubanga). Fwandafwanda as well as her daughter katambala originate from the ing’omba Mubanga of Namopala’s. This is a chiefdom north of Chibale across the border with Congo where cindanga is another word for icila. Kapoya is the name of the spirit possessing the ing’omba Mubanga.
The fwandafwanda came to Chibale via Muchinda, a chiefdom north of Chibale.

Spirit origin of social dance songs

Mubanga is said to be a muomba wa fwandafwanda, a fwandafwanda ing’omba. Together with the cinsengwe-icila, the fwandafwanda and her daughter katambala are social dance types with a spirit origin. Because of its age this could not be ascertained for the cinko though we found one example of this. For mbeni and kalindula this is not possible because their origin lay outside of the Lala region.

Song 63

A fwandafwanda song as remembered by Mika Mwape Chungwa, 1986.

Text of Song 63 ∵ Your dancing like the Nsenga

Mwebakashi amasha ngamwaleta
Pantu mukofina ati baNsenga
Mwakunkonwena ne nsonto ee oo

You wife, this dancing you brought
Because of your dancing like the Nsenga
You might break my penis

Historical references to fwandafwanda

Songs and dances in Zambia: fwandafwanda. In town the Lala region was known, among others, for its fwandafwanda. This seems to corroborate an origin from the Lala region. It was a circle & group dance accompanied by three normal drums¹Tracey mentions three conical drums: akanono, cimbulunge and fwandafwanda as the accompanying drums. Kanono is a similar word as kace. Cimbulunge was not known as a drum name in Chibale in the 1980s. Because the iyikulu is the true musical expression of the dance, it occurs that it is called after the dance.. The dancers forming the circle moved anticlockwise during the singing and clockwise during the instrumental interludes.
An early daughter of, or maybe another word for, fwandafwanda was nsase, also mentioned by Tracey in 1957²Tracey (https://folkways.si.edu/group-of-five-lala-men-and-chorus-of-six-lala-women/abalala-bafuma-ili-batemuna/track/smithsonian) in a programme note of his 1957 recording of Lala music at Roan Antelope Mine, Luanshya: “Abalala bafuma ili batemuna. Accompanied by a goblet drum, five Lala men and six Lala women perform this ceremonial dance-song (nsase)”..

Music example 38

A fragment of a fwandafwanda song recorded by Hugh Tracey in Mufulira, 1957.

Text of Music example 38 ∵ We have reached the dancing floor

Oh twafika twatilika mu mucipango
Mwacombela mayanda mwatunta
Mucalo ciweme bama bamune yoyoyo
Owe iyalala bamune

We have reached the dancing floor at the palace
Where real drummers’ beats shake the houses
In a beautiful country oh mother my friends
Oh iyalala my friends

Mu cipango (at the palace): the dance floor is a place to shine.
Tracey adds: “Tilika is the name of the dancefloor at the Mufulira mine where the Lala usually go to dance. The fwanda-fwanda is a dance performed in two lines, men in one, and women in the other. As they dance, the two lines form a circle. Performers move slowly around the circle, accompanied by a trio of drums”.³In a programme note of Tracey’s 1957 recordings of Lala music at the Mufulira Mine. https://folkways.si.edu/group-of-lala-men-and-women-dancers/nafika-mwa-tilika-mucipango/track/smithsonian.

Katambala

Songs and dances in Zambia: fwandafwanda. In the beginning of the 1970s the fwandafwanda went through a revival due to the efforts of Musonda Chunga, the biggest commercial farmer in Chibale in the 1980s and 1990s (later an MP and Serenje District Commissioner from 2003 until 2011) who was in contact with Mubanga via the Chikubula brothers from Muchinda. With men working at his farm he formed a well-known band. The name of this daughter of fwandafwanda was katambala, a word taken from the text of the song that heralded the revival. Like this song, katambala songs are often about problems, witchcraft and death. The katambala dance is the same as that of the fwandafwanda.

Song 64

A katambala song by people of the Kapampalwe seksioni, 1981.

Text of Song 64 ∵ My handkerchief is lost

Katambala kandi kaliluba – Nakulema kufwaya mu lubansa
Nibwangu bafwile bama – Cawayawaya nibwangu bafwile bama
Tekwendelako ku Kabuingo – Kumawilo pepi ne Saninga
Kabekala bata ba Wili kobekala ba Ciwila

My handkerchief is lost – I will really try to find it in the dancing space
It’s just recently that my mother died – Cawayawaya, it’s just recently that my mother died
I can’t go to Kabuingo – At the confluence near Saninga
Where my father, Wili, lives and where Ciwila lives

The song text that heralded the revival of fwandafwanda under the name of katambala in 1972.
Cawayawaya is a description of the sound of musical instruments accompanying mourning songs.

Katambala, a revival

Songs and dances in Zambia: fwandafwanda. This revival seems to be the only music revival in Chibale that had a purpose as described by Livingston (1999: 68) for music revivals: “(1) to serve as cultural opposition and as an alternative to mainstream culture, and (2) to improve existing culture through the values based on historical value and authenticity expressed by revivalists”. After a period of little development in music, except in the field of christian music, katambala emerged as a link to the icila tradition that existed before the ‘christian interlude’ (1940s up to 1970s).
Earlier revivals in the icila were related to a form of novelty: to bring in an older style which is new for the present generation, next to novelties like the bringing in of a new catchy phrase or a new dance movement. Other movements of resurgence like those of hunter’s cult and of ing’omba at the beginning of the 1900s and Ciwila in the 1980s were far more comprehensive than a music or dance revival alone.