This video is a group of guys who make all the musical sounds minus the doorbell ring using their bodies. Body percussion can be as simple as what we did in class today when we added the different layers of a song using claps and slaps or as advanced as the dance moves seen in the video. Body percussion done well is just cool!, but it also really resonated with the YouTube video we watched today in class about the African music/sound culture and how "there is no movement without rhythm." The rhythms used in this video also sound similar to drum beats heard in some of the African music we have listened to in class.
The second video combines Native American and Celtic music cultures through the Native American flute performance of "Great Blue Heron." The first few minutes of the video, Arvel Bird, the performer talks about the title of the piece and relates it back to nature. How he relates the heron to human nature is very much aligned with the Native American's beliefs and how music ties into it all. You can hear the Celtic inspiration in the accompaniment a lot but also occasionally in the flute's melodic line.
My final entry for Cool Stuff No. 1 is a video of women from the BaAka of Central Africa. Dr. Vaneman spoke about this tribe briefly in class today on how they had very little contact with the outside world. In this video the women are using the water as a drum. Tying into the idea that nomadic people would not want to have to carry around large instruments, the women of this tribe are using the natural resources to make music. Hope you like this cool stuff!
All cool stuff, Chloe. I'm not sure I'd be so quick to label the Native American flute style as having "Celtic" influences, though. There's a certain "modern world music" sound that we'll hear coming from the contemporary music of many of our cultures, but it's not really home ground to any of them. And I LOVED the first video. You must now go and check out some early Bobby McFerrin, during the "Spontaneous Inventions" album. :-)
ReplyDeleteI really liked how you looked at the way these cultures utilize their natural resources. I had heard about the water slapping before, so seeing a video of it was cool! The body percussion was awesome too.
ReplyDeleteThat first video is really cool! I love watching how they create the different sounds with their bodies. It's amazing the range of sound they could get without any instruments.
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