Delving deeper into West African percussive music

Hello and welcome to today's lesson, which is entitled, Delving Deeper into West African Percussive Music. My name's Mr. Norris and I'm going to be working with you today as we build on our understanding of some of the key principles of West African percussive music that we've already explored. So let's get into it. The main outcome for today's lesson is I can understand and perform some more complex examples of West African percussive music. So we're gonna be looking at some key concepts and fundamentals and then doing a task that applies to them in a performance setting as well. Our key words for today's lesson. The first is simple time. Simple time is where each beat is divided into two quavers. 4/4 and 3/4 are examples of this. So these are time signatures. Compound time, and this is where each beat is divided into three quavers. Examples would be 6/8 and 12/8. Polyrhythm. When multiple rhythms are played at the same time, we call this a polyrhythm. And finally, dununba. And dununba is the type of dance and music in compound time from Guinea. The first part of our lesson today then is focused on West African dance in compound time. Let's get into it. There are two types of time signatures. Simple time is where each beat can be divided into two quavers or four semiquavers. That's the same thing. The most common time signatures are in simple time, including 2/4, 3/4 and 4/4. So usually when we start learning music, we start playing in simple time and you will divide a beat into two quavers. That's usually the normal way that we learn. However, a slightly more complex type of time signature, is called compound time. And this is where each beat can be divided into three quavers. 6/8, 9/8, and 12/8 are examples of compound time signatures. And you might have come across these before, or if you've not knowingly come across them, it's very likely that you've heard some music that uses one of these time signatures as well. So we've got simple time, where we've got two quavers in a beat, and we've got compound time where we've got three quavers in a beat. In simple time we count one and two and three and four and. Or if it had three beats in a bar, one and two and three and. So adding an and in between each number. And that means we're dividing each beat into two quavers. So we can see an example there of a bar of 4/4, and we can count those quavers, one and two and three and four and. Let's have a quick listen and let's see what that would sound like. (percussion beating) One and two and three and four. And that's our simple time. In compound time we count one and a two and a three and a four and a. So it's slightly different. And we're adding an extra subdivision into each beat. So we can see there each beat is divided into three, one and a, that's three different subdivisions. One and a two and a three and a four and a. There's an example there. And 12/8 is a compound time signature. So we've got a bar of compound time signature there, bar of 12/8, and each beat is divided into three. Let's have a little listen to that. (percussion music) So hopefully there you could hear the difference between our simple time signature, one and two and three and four and, and that compound time signature, one and a two and a three and a four and a. And although both have an overall feel of four beats, so there are four strong beats in the bar, each beat is subdivided differently. So in the first case into two quavers and in the second case into three quavers. And when you're thinking about simple and compound time signatures, I would strongly recommend that you use words like this example of and or and a to help you count the number of quavers per beat. You might hear people using different words to help them count the number of quavers as well. But I think this is quite a good one, quite a simple one to remember. So if it's simple, it'll be one and two and. If it's compound, one and a two and a, and so on. To identify the difference between simple and compound time then we need to subdivide the beat to either two or three quavers as we've just been exploring. I'm gonna play you a clip now. I'd like you to try and work out is this in simple or compound time? Let's have a listen. (percussion music) So I'll just give you a few more seconds to come up with your answer. Is it in simple or compound time? And let's talk this one through then. So this clip was in compound time and the reason we know that is because the beats are divided into three, we could have counted one and a two and a three and a four and a, one and a two and a three and a four and a with that. And we couldn't really have counted. It would really harder to count one and two and three and four and. Let's check your understanding of that. True or false. In compound time, the beat is divided into two quavers. And once you've come up with your answer, I'd like to think as to why. So justify your answer as well. You can pause my video while you do that. Let's go through this one then. So in compound time the beat is not divided into two quavers. So that would be false. And the justification, our explanation for that is that in simple time the beat is divided into two quavers and in compound time the beat is divided into three quavers. So getting that distinction between the two is really important and well done if you've got that correct there. Which of these time signatures is not in compound time? 4/4, 6/8, 9/8 or 12/8. I'll give you a few seconds to come up with your answer. And the correct answer here then is 4/4. That is an example of a simple time signature and as we know that's very common time signature. Whereas all the other three, 6/8, 9/8, 12/8 are all compound time signatures where the beat is divided into three quavers. So well done if you got that correct. West African music is highly rhythmic and with the use of cross rhythm and polyrhythm, it's sometimes hard to hear the underlying beat. There are many examples of West African music for dance with an overall feel of both simple and compound time. So in some senses we can have both going on at the same time. It feels like we have some of the beats divided into three and at the same time those beats are divided into two by different instruments. This example of Akom, which is a type of religious song and dance performed by the Akan people bassd mostly in Ghana, has an overall feel of compound time. I'd like to listen to it. And as you listen to it I'd like you to try and identify what typical features of West African percussion music can you identify, including those that make it suitable for dancing. So really focusing on those key features of the styles that we've looked at so far and the fundamentals of those styles, but focusing on the ones that make it really suitable for dancing. So you can pause my video and have a listen. Let's review some of the things you might have said there. So the music is really suitable for dancing because it has a strong pulse. That's really key. Any effective style of dance music has to have a strong pulse so you can dance in time with it. And as we know, that's a really common feature of many styles of West African percussive music. It has a fast tempo, has an upbeat tempo, it's highly rhythmic and it has poly polyrhythms and cross rhythms. So if you picked up on either of those two that it has polyrhythm and cross rhythm, really well done. That's such a typical feature of many of the styles from this region and it's also a really effective feature to use in dance styles. And finally it uses percussion instruments and you might have picked up on djembe, dunun, agogo bell and shekere, and it emphasizes the rhythmic nature of the music. So percussion instruments are really effective in making music that sounds very rhythmic. The singing style, which uses call and response, is also a common feature of many traditional West African styles of music. That relationship between one singer and a group of other singers, or one singer and some instruments interacting in a sort of call and response is such a typical feature of that. Let's check your understanding. Which two drums are typically used in the percussive music of West Africa? Tabla, djembe, or dunun? I'll give you a few seconds, choose two. And the correct answers here then would be djembe and dunun. We tend to associate the tabla with music from the Indian subcontinent rather than from West Africa, whereas both of those two instruments are very common in this region. For task A, you're gonna listen to a couple of clips and answer the questions. For the first clip, is this clip in compound or simple time? Remember you're trying to identify if there are two quavers or three quavers in each beat and you could use the one and two and three and four and, or one and a two and a three and a four and a methods to try and work that out. Then identify two instruments typical of West African traditional music. And finally, is this a polyrhythm? And then for the second clip. Again, is this clip in compound or simple time? Use the same technique. What typical vocal technique can you hear? And then finally name one type of body percussion that is used. So try to pick out some percussive sounds that are created using body. So you can pause my video and give this task your best shot. Good luck. Let's go through this task then. The first clip was in simple time. So if you were trying to use the counting technique, you would've been able to count one and two and three and four and. There were two quavers per beat. Well done if you got that. Two instruments typical of West African traditional music, well there was a djembe, there was dunun, there was an agogo bell and a shekere. So you could have mentioned any two of those. And it was a polyrhythm, So there were multiple rhythms playing at the same time. For the second clip, this one was in compound time, so there were three quavers per beat and you would've been counting one and a two and a three and a four and a. There was call and response. That's the vocal technique I was looking for there. And that's an important one to remember when we're thinking about traditional techniques and traditional styles in West Africa. And then clapping was the type of body percussion that is used. And again, that's an underrated but often heavily used piece of body percussion in many styles of music from this region and more broadly around the world as well. So well done if you picked up on that. We're gonna move on now to the second part of our lesson. And for this we're looking at performing dununba. Dununba is a type of dance and music that uses specific rhythms. These dances originated from Guinea, which is a country in West Africa and they're often referred to as the dance of the strong men. So that's what they're supposed to symbolize and represent. This dance, like all dununba, is in compound time. So remember that's where there are three quavers per beat. I'd like you to pause my video, have a listen and see if you can count the four beats pulse. There are four beats in a bar, see if you can count along with it and feel that pulse. You can do that now. So hopefully there you managed to identify the four beat pulse with all the different rhythms going on, picking out those four strong beats, and that's gonna be really key when we're doing our task a little bit later on. So this example is in fast 12/8. So it means there are four beats in a bar, four strong beats and each one is divided into three, one and a two and a three and a four, and a one and a two and a three and a four, and a one and a two and a three and a four. I'd like you to pause my video and just practice saying that at quite a fast tempo like that. That might seem like a bit of a strange task, but that will actually come in really useful when we're doing our performance task a little bit later. So this dununba is a five part polyrhythm. So that means there are five different rhythms playing at the same time. Let's have a listen to it. (percussion music) So as you can hear, it's quite complex and with those five different rhythms all crossing over each other and creating different effects, it is quite a complex polyrhythm we have going. Now the simplest rhythms are played by the agogo and the dunun. This is our agogo rhythm, let's have a listen to it. (upbeat percussion music) So it's a fast tempo and we've got these offbeat quavers that are being used creating quite a complex rhythm there. One a two a three a four a, one a two a three a four and. One a two a three a four and. That's our agogo rhythm there. The second rhythm we're gonna look at is the dunun rhythm. And as we know, the dunun is a two-headed drum that creates different pitched sounds. So for this we want a low-pitched sound and a high-pitched sound. And when you're recreating this, if you can't find an exact authentic dunun sound, then you'll be able to recreate the effect of it using a different drum, as long as you can use a low pitch and a high pitch. Let's have a listen to what this rhythm sounds like. (percussion music) So that's the simplest rhythm that we're gonna be using in this task. And as we can hear there. One a two, three, four, one a two, three, four. And our two, three and four are all on the higher-pitched sound. One a two, three, four, one a two, three, four. So that's what we're going for on dunun. Let's move on to look at some of the other rhythms. There are also three djembe rhythms that use three different sounds. Bass, which is the lowest-pitched sound. Tone, which is the mid-pitch sound and then slap, which is the highest-pitched of the three. So if you've played djembe before, you'll know there are these three different sounds we can create and we need to be using those when we're creating these djembe rhythms. This is the first djembe rhythm. Let's have a listen to it. (percussion music) So as you can hear there, again, it's a fast rhythm. One a two and a three, four, and a one a two and a three, four and a one, a two and a three, four and a. And we've got these two different sounds. We've got the high-pitched slap and then we've also got the mid pitched tone. We'll look again at that in a little second. The second djembe rhythm uses a low-pitched bass and a mid-pitched tone. Let's have a listen to what that sounds like. (percussion music) So there, particularly at the end of that one, it's quite a tricky rhythm to get accurate and it's because we've got some offbeat quavers there as well. And you'll notice that we're using a mixture of tone and bass for that one. Let's have a look at the final djembe rhythm. And this one's a particularly difficult one because almost every beat uses offbeat notes, so we don't play on the beat very often at all. Let's have a listen to what this sounds like. (percussion music) So you can hear most of those rhythms are off the beat. So it's really important that you're practicing it accurately using the offbeat quavers before you try and record that one. And then if we listen to all five of those rhythms together, so dunun, agogo and our three djembes, we get the complete complex polyrhythm. (percussion music) Let's look at first of all how we can play the dunun and agogo rhythms. I'll play this video for you now. And the rhythms for dununba. The first I'm gonna do is the agogo bell. And if you're doing this live, you can either use an agogo or if you don't have access to one use a cow bell or a similar bell instrument that you hit with a stick. The rhythm is gonna sound like this. One a two a three a four and. One a two a three a four and. One a two a three a four and. I'm gonna record it in here. Here we go. (percussive music) Three, four, one a two a three a four and. You'll hear the metronome if you set it to 12/8 in GarageBand actually counts every single quaver. So there's quite a lot going on there. And if I'm quantizing, I'm gonna quantize the quavers. Let's have a listen to that. (percussion music) One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. I'm happy with that. I'm gonna leave the metronome off now just so you can hear my parts a bit better when I'm recording. Okay, so the next one is the dunun. And for this one we need two different sounds. We need a low-pitched and a high-pitched sound. For this, most DAWS, software doesn't have a dunun sound, some might, but I've just found the closest sounds that I can. And obviously if you're doing this live and don't have access to a dunun, a low-pitched drum will work quite well. So something like a four ton or or a big conga or a big djembe might do for this. (percussion music) That's my rhythm. One and two, three, four. One and two, three, four. And the one and is on the low-pitched part of the drum. So I'm gonna record that in now. (percussion music) Turn that down a bit so we hear the agogo. Let's hear those two together. (percussion music) I'm happy with that. And now let's look at how we can add the djembe rhythms to bring together all five parts of the complex polyrhythm. The three djembe parts. So again, if you're doing this live, you're gonna want three different djembe rhythms. If you don't have three people to play the djembes, start with the djembe one rhythm and prioritize that one. And then if you have a second player, you can add djembe two. And if you have enough players, you can add all three different djembe rhythms. If you're doing this on a DAW as I am here, you're gonna need the three different djembe sounds. Slap tone and bass. (percussion music) Slap being the highest one, tone being the sort of middle-pitch one and bass being the lowest one. So here I've got slap, tone and bass. It's gonna sound like this. One and a two and a three, four, and a one a two and a three, four, and a one and two and a three, four, and a one a two and a three, four and a. (percussion music continues) Let's record that in. (percussion music) Is that awesome? (percussion music) Just make sure it's perfect in time. So that's my first djembe rhythm done. And I say if you only have one djembe player, that's the rhythm to play. If you do have a second djembe player, we're gonna add djembe two. And this one uses tone and bass. So I've got on my DAW here, I've got tone and bass, there's my two sounds there. This rhythm goes like this, it goes one and three and a a, one and three and a a, one and three and a a, one and three and a and. It's quite a tricky rhythm this, really syncopated, really offbeat. Here we go. Let's have a go at this one. Two, three, four. (percussion music) Let's just listen to that track on its own with the dunun. And you can hear the rhythm here. (percussion music) Quite a tricky rhythm that and verbalizing it using the one and three and that and will really help you to get that in time. And then finally, if you do have a third djembe player, you can add djembe three. And this one uses slap and tone again. My slap and my tone sounds there. Again, a really syncopated tricky rhythm this one. It's gonna go. It's gonna go and and that and and that and and that and and that. So it doesn't actually play on any of the beats. One and and that and and that one and and that and and that. So you've gotta be really listening and feeling the feel of the strong beats so you can play those offbeat notes there. I've gotta play in this one. I'm just gonna record it with a dunun. Here we go. (percussion music) Three, four. Gonna quickly quantize that and make sure it's absolutely perfect. Let's hear those two together. (percussion music) Here's the agogo. Here's the second djembe. And here's all the parts. (percussion music continues) So when you're playing this or when you're practicing it, wtart with the simple rhythms first. So start with your agogo, your dunun rhythm and your djembe one. And if you have the opportunity add in those extra two really syncopated djembe parts, djembe two and djembe three as well. And the priority is making sure that you have a strong pulse and that you're always coming back to beat one at the same time. So that even if you get out of time, you feel that beat one together and start your rhythms again together on beat one and that way you'll be able to keep it going and really get in sync with each other. It's a tricky task this. Give it your best shot, see how you go. Let's check your understanding then. Which uses the correct rhythms of dununba? I'm gonna play you these three clips A, B, and C. And you can see the notation on the right hand side there. I'd like you to identify which one correctly plays these rhythms. Here's option A. (percussion music) Here's option B. (percussion music) And then finally option C. (percussion music) So quickly finishing your answer, which one played the correct rhythms of dununba? And well done then if you correctly said it was option C. And the reason we know that is because it's playing in compound time. The other two examples were playing in a simple time signatures. Just have a listen to it briefly again. (percussion music) And that's got that one and a two and a three and a four and a compound time feel that means it was the correct answer. Really well done if you correctly got that. For task B, you're gonna perform or record the dununba rhythms. Use djembe, dunun and agogo if possible, or if not possible, try and use as similar sounding instruments as you can. We'll try and be authentic wherever possible. If you're using live instruments, practice your rhythm with the counting on its own first. So whichever rhythm you've been tasked with playing, practice that and make sure you're counting your one and a two and a three and a four and a to help you play it accurately. Then as a group, start with one rhythm and gradually add the others. So don't all try and play at once to begin with. Gradually layer it up to help you get it correct. Make sure you start slowly, that's really key as well. So all the examples we've listened to so far are quite fast, but when you're learning it, practicing it, slow it down a bit to get it accurate before you then speed it up. If you're doing it on a DAW, ensure the time signature is set to 6/8. And that's because many DAWs won't give you the option of 12/8, but this will work fine in 6/8. Record each rhythm in a separate track and quantize it to 1/8 notes. So remember we're using quavers and that means that we'll quantize to 1/8 notes. There are different rhythms that you're gonna use, agogo, dunun, and our three djembe rhythms. And remember with the djembe rhythms to differentiate between tone, bass and slaps. So the first rhythm uses tone and slap. Second one uses tone and bass, and then the third one again uses tone and slap. So try and differentiate between those three different sounds to make sure that we're really getting the full colors and the full texture of dununba. So you can pause my video now and give this your best shot. Good luck. Let's move on to the final part of this lesson. And for this task what we're gonna do is have a listen to an example of a dununba performance. And all I'd like to know is what could they do to improve it? Here we go. (percussion music) I'm gonna play that one more time and as I'm playing it a second time, see if you can come up with your answer, one thing they can improve. (percussion music) Okay, so I'll give you a few seconds to finish your answer. And here's some things we could have said then. So the agogo player should play their rhythm more accurately and in time. At the moment, the agogo rhythm is not quite in time. Some of the quavers are a bit rushed. So well done if you identified that. And then secondly, the balance could be improved. At the moment we can't hear all the instruments because some are too quiet and some are too loud. So making sure we have that balance wo every part can be heard equally is really important. Well done if you picked up on either of those two points. It's time to summarize today's lesson. West African percussive music often uses complex polyrhythms. West African musicians traditionally don't use notation, but instead they learn rhythms by ear and through movement. And that's quite different than the way we often approach music in Europe and in America. A compound time signature has each beat divided into three quavers. 6/8 is a common example of this. In a simple time signature, each beat is divided into two quavers. And finally, some West African music has a feel of compound time, including akom and dununba. So that brings us to the end of today's lesson. Thank you very much for taking part. The practical task in particular is a tough one today, it's really quite challenging to get all those different rhythms playing together accurately and creating that really complex and really interesting polyrhythm. So if you managed to do that, really well done and regardless, well done for getting stuck in and giving it your best shot. That also brings us to the end of this little unit, which has been focused on some of the West African percussive traditions. I hope you feel that you've got a grasp of some of the core aspects and core fundamentals of some of the music from this region. We've only really briefly touched on some very small aspects of a really diverse range of music from this area of the world, but hopefully you feel like you've explored some interesting music and have a bit more of an understanding of some of the things that are typical of some of the styles there. Thank you very much for taking part, and I'll see you in another lesson sometime.