, Republic of (Chich. Dziko la Malaŵi).
Country in south-central Africa. It has an area of 118,480 km2 and a population of 10·98 million (2000 estimate). The official languages are English and Chichewa (Chewa). The name Malawi first appeared on a Portuguese map in 1546, referring to a powerful empire with which Portuguese traders on the Zambezi river had contact. The languages spoken in the former Malawi empire, whose territory covered much of the present central region, part of the southern region and adjacent areas in Zambia and Mozambique, belonged to a dialect continuum now split into Chinyanja (Nyanja), Chichewa and Chimang’anja (Manganja). British influence in the area began in the 1870s. British Protectorate rule over the territory that was to be called Nyasaland was established in 1907. In 1953–63 Nyasaland was part of the Central African Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, ruled from Salisbury (now Harare). The territory gained independence in 1964 under the name Malawi.
GERHARD KUBIK, MOYA ALIYA MALAMUSI
Musical traditions in Malawi can be divided into six broad culture-geographical areas (fig.1). Although some musical traits, instruments and dance genres have interregional distribution across the country, six geographic areas demonstrate significant coherence.
(iv) Chewa heartland (central region).
Malawi, §1: Main musical style areas
Sena music and dance traditions are different from others in Malawi. The following characteristics can be isolated: approximately equiheptatonic tunings of musical instruments; construction of music within tonal-harmonic cycles, usually consisting of four segments; a relationship between Sena and Shona (Zimbabwe) musical cultures, for example in bi-chord sequences, polyphonic singing, chingolingo (yodelling) and the use of many different musical instruments (Kubik, 1968; Kubik and Malamusi, 1989; Tracey, 1991; Malamusi, 1995). The music of the Nyungwe, Phodzo (Podzo) and other minority groups in southernmost Malawi also belongs to this style cluster, with some differences.
According to regional surveys of Sena music and dance carried out in 1989–95, traditions include dances, solo songs and storytelling and musical instruments. Dances include: likhuba, a dance in which everyone participates with drums; maseseto and njore, women's dances performed at girls' initiation ceremonies, and mafuwe, women's dance with hand-clapping. The popularity of dance traditions changes. A popular dance performed by Sena women in 1967 was utse, performed by a solo dancer with rapid pelvis movements. Other dance traditions maintain continuous popularity, such as the circle dance performed by men and women around a valimba (xylophone). Solo songs and storytelling activities appear in a variety of contexts. Sena women perform pounding songs with elaborate vocal techniques, including chingolingo. Some songs contained in stories are organized in a polyphonic style with interlocking texts and syllable phrases (Kubik and Malamusi, 1989). Among the most important musical instruments used by solo performers is the 14- or 16-string bangwe (board zither with external resonator). Famous historical performers are the blind bangwe minstrel Chamboko Chinamulungu (Kubik and Malamusi, 1989) and Matulo Malulira (b 1937) of Tomas village. Two types of mouth-resonated musical bows, nyakatangali and nyakazeze (friction bow), are used by men for individual music-making. Another individual music-making instrument is a large lamellophone with 26 or more notes laid out in two ranks, usually called malimba in Nsanje and Chikwawa districts. Xylophone music has brought Sena musicians international renown.
Valimba (or ulimba) is the common name for xylophones heard in the lower Shire river area, usually referring to a large, gourd-resonated xylophone (fig.2). The tuning system is equiheptatonic according to several researchers (Kubik, 1968; van Zanten, 1980; Kubik and Malamusi, 1989, p.29; Tracey, 1991). Madudu (gourd resonators) are attached below the keys with rectangular openings cut into the side of each calabash. These openings are closed with a spider's-nest mirliton whose function is to amplify and prolong sound by sympathetic resonance.
Valimba groups also include a gaka, a small single-headed drum on three legs and two nkhocho (tin rattles) played by one musician. Valimba playing is difficult, and many musicians learn at a young age. Famous players have emerged from the lower Shire river area, such as Johnny Zuze (Kubik and Malamusi, 1989). The best-known group of the 1990s is the Kambazithe Makolekole Valimba Band from Lauji village in Chikwawa district. Makolekole and his musicians have already had three concert tours, one to South Africa and two to Germany, and their music has been analysed by Andrew Tracey (1991).
Nyungwe music and dance traditions are related to Sena traditions, but there are important differences. The Nyungwe are known for the thunga la ngororombe (panpipe dance) dance tradition (Malamusi, 1992). Ngororombe is the name for both the dance and the instruments. The panpipes, made from bamboo, are also called nyanga. Several tuned bamboo tubes are joined to make one nyanga. They are given individual names according to pitch and compared to members of a family; some names refer to animal sounds such as kwalila mvuu (how the hippopotamus roars). The musicians, sometimes 20 to 30 performers, form a circle and move anticlockwise. Each musician holds a nyanga, playing complementary patterns based on mnemonic syllables. During dances performers wear nkhocho (rattles) wrapped around their right leg. Some of the complex movements have been transcribed by A. Tracey (1992). Ngororombe can be played for entertainment, at funerals or for mizimu (ancestral spirits).
The music and dance traditions of the Mang'anja represent a different style, in spite of cross-cultural contacts with their neighbours now settled in the lower Shire river area. Mang'anja traditions include: chitsukulumwe, women's dance songs accompanied by long gourd rattles filled with grain and struck against the thigh; alimba, one-note xylophones played in groups for religious purposes; and gule wa chimang'anja, a masked dance in Chimang'anja style. Musical instruments such as the seven-string bangwe have a pentatonic tuning.
One-note xylophones have long been established among the Mang'anja; they are associated with demonstrating reverence for ancestors, and are played in groups. Among the Mang'anja one wooden slat is suspended between two curved twigs and mounted on a large calabash. Rubber is glued on to the centre of the slat; its quantity determines the tuning. In groups, alimba of different sizes and pitches are used with names such as thokoso, kantiya, nkalikali and gwagwa.
Another important Mang'anja tradition is masked performance. Mang'anja secret societies with masks exist in Chief Lundu's home near Matope on the Shire river and downstream as far as Chikwawa, and a Mang'anja group has been established near Chileka in Blantyre district. Mang'anja masked performers wear long, robe-like garments and heads carved of wood, including one woodcarving in the form of a crocodile's mouth. The masked dance is accompanied by a tuned drum-chime without singing.
Mang'anja minstrels are known for playing individual instruments such as the n'ngoli (one-string bowed lute) and bangwe. In contrast to Sena tradition, the Mang'anja bangwe has seven strings. An extraordinary figure among bangwe minstrels of the lower Shire was Limited Mfundo (b early 1920s) of Namila village. In an interview with Malamusi in 1984, he stated that his musical inspiration came from his maternal uncle who played n'ngoli. When his uncle died, he began to play bangwe to earn money to pay the poll tax.
Malawi, §1: Main musical style areas
This area includes roughly present-day Blantyre, Mwanza and Ncheu districts. Hugh Tracey recorded Ngoni traditions in 1958 at Njolomole, near Mulangeni, Ncheu district, the residence of the Inkosi ya Makosi Gomani chiefs. He recorded funeral songs, obsequies after funerals and historical fighting songs (Nurse 1966–7; Tracey, 1973).
The ngoma warriors' dance is performed with shields and spears by Ngoni descendants and others in many villages (Kubik and others, 1982, p.166; Muyenza and Strumpf, 1983). Nkhwendo, a dance performed with long bamboo scrapers (Kubik and others, 1982, p.154), is also attributed to the Ngoni. Another tradition that has been traced back to Ngoni immigration is the performance of the nkangala mouth-resonated musical bow, played exclusively by women (Kubik and others, 1987, pp.7–13).
Large single-headed wooden ng'oma (drums) with tube-shaped extensions were used by the Ambo (also called Antumba) in the 1960s along with a single iron bell for a variety of dances, including dulila (Kubik and others, 1982, p.150). By the late 1970s these drums had disappeared. An experienced bangwe performer in the same village in 1967 was Murimanthewe (b 1940), whose sarcastic songs are still appreciated by audiences who can follow the twists of the language (Opeka Njimbo, 1989). Murimanthewe also performed with a small six-note sansi lamellophone.
There are several dzamba (dance genres) in Blantyre, Mwanza and Ncheu districts. Kachowe, a dance performed by men and women at parties with millet beer, can be accompanied by drums or, in their absence, household utensils. Khunju is another popular dance genre performed long ago to placate the spirits of those who showed signs of spiritual affliction. Today it is performed on occasions similar to kachowe. Nyimbo za chinamwali (girls' initiation songs) are still prominent in rural areas. During periods of seclusion and on the occasion of coming-out ceremonies, drums are played by female colleagues and guardians. Gule wa nkulu (masked dancing) in the Chipeta style with individual masked characters is widespread. There are many local branches of this secret society in the area (Kubik and Malamusi, 1987; Kubik, 1993, pp.136–60).
A characteristic of southern highlands music-dance traditions in the last 150 years is that most came with massive immigration of people from neighbouring areas. Another characteristic is the strong influence of Christianity and nyimbo za makwaya (choir songs). The Christian community has split into rival factions, from established churches such as CCAP (Presbyterian), Aloma (Roman Catholic), Seventh Day Adventist etc. to nativistic movements such as Ziyoni (Zionists), each with a tradition of nyimbo za uzimu (religious songs). Ziyoni in particular are known for large military-style drums and vigorous circle-dancing in white gowns. Ziyoni and another nativistic religious movement, the Apostolic Church, include spirit possession in their services.
Malawi, §1: Main musical style areas
This culture area includes the related musical traditions of the Akhokola (Kokola), Alomwe (Lomwe) and Yao. Strong instrumental traditions are a feature of Akhokola culture. A rare type of large, bell-shaped, 15–16 note sasi lamellophone was played among musicians of considerable age at the home of chief Kolowiko (Kubik, 1968). The mambira is a heptatonic-tuned log xylophone with broad, flat wooden slats attached to banana stems, characteristic of trough-resonated Chuwambo xylophones in Mozambique (Kubik and others, 1982, pp.110–11).
There are several Akhokola traditions common to their neighbours, the Lomwe, such as the thakare (one-string bowed lute) in Chikhokhola (Kokhola) and thangari in Elomwe, the same instrument known as n'ngoli among the Mang'anja and kaligo in other places, including Nkhotakota. The one-string bowed lute spread to Malawi and eastern Zambia during long-distance trade in ivory and slaves by the Yao and Bisa in the late 18th and the 19th centuries. It is usually constructed with a long stick pierced through a gourd resonator covered with a lizard skin. Its only string is made of sisal or other material, attached to the stick with a peg and an adjustable tuning loop. The bow often has a string made of palm leaf (fig.3).
Lomwe traditions include a number of popular village dance genres now performed mostly for entertainment, such as chopa, jiri, likwata, masalimo and makhwayara. Chipo, nantongwe and nserebwede are dances performed to commemorate the deceased, and lupanda is associated with boys' initiation. One of the most popular dance genres is sekere, performed at beer parties and other social events, accompanied by a set of drums of different sizes, rattles and hoe-blade for striking a time-line.
The Lomwe shitata, a seven-note board lamellophone, is now rarely seen. The mambirira, a log xylophone usually with seven slats and performed by two boys sitting across from each other, is still common. In the mid-1980s a new music was initiated by Mário Sabuneti, then about 20 years old, at Nnesa village. Inspired by the sekere dance, he and his fellow performers constructed a drum-chime of eight tuned drums to be performed by one person. He called his invention samba ng'oma eight, with each drum given a distinct name.
In spite of stylistic affinities, strong Islamic influences on several Yao musical traditions distinguish them from those of the Lomwe, such as Qur'anic recitation by two performers, teacher and student. Other Islamic traditions exist among the Yao, such as syala, an annual Islamic meeting and festival and sikiri, the local pronunciation of dhikr. Among the Yao, sikiri has lost some of its original traits such as spirit possession, but it maintains the use of ecstatic guttural sounds produced by the participants, possibly inducing hyperventilation (Thorold, 1993, p.84). Young boys frequent the madalasa (Arab: madrasa) schools in the mosques, and ancient educational institutions such as lupanda for boys and chiputu for girls gradually adapted to an Islamic world-view and transformed into jando and nsondo. The strict gender segregation and the promotion of strong social cohesion among the community of men in Islamic Yao society counterbalances the traditional matrilineal social order.
Trading contacts with the East African coast brought musical instruments such as the sese (flat-bar zither) to Malawi. It is now rare, but in 1984 L. Malamusi and Kubik documented a family performance tradition near Zomba, involving a father and his son (Kubik and Malamusi, 1989). A sese is constructed of a flat wooden bar with raised frets. Three to four strings are attached along the length of the bar, one passing on top of the frets, the other along the side. One or two composite gourds serve as resonators. By means of a cord these resonators are attached to the bar, but they can be tightened and loosened as required by the musician just by turning the two parts of the gourd diametrically against each other. An additional device serves as a buzzer. On Yona Nnema's instrument the buzzer was a duck quill attached with a fibre cord to the flat bar of the sese, just below the fourth string. The quill was bent into the shape of a bridge and brought up from below to within less than half a millimetre from the string. When the musician sounded a string, it vibrated lightly against the quill, resulting in a buzzing timbre (fig.4).
Although log xylophones with banana stem bases were probably known in the Ruvuma river area for centuries, Yao trading contacts contributed further to their dissemination. Among the Yao they are called mangolongondo, a representation of the onomatopoeic sound patterns produced by the log xylophone – ngólò-ngòndò. The Yao variety usually has nine or ten wooden slats and is played by two people sitting opposite each other, sometimes joined by a third player who strikes the five-stroke, 12-pulse time-line pattern on the highest-pitched slat. This instrument is often played in the maize fields to scare away baboons (Kubik and others, 1987, pp.31–46). There are two centres of mangolongondo playing north of Makanjila in Mangochi district. One centre at Nkopiti village was headed by the virtuoso xylophone player Waisoni Msusa (b 1948) who attracted several students, including a musical prodigy, Tawina Mdala, a boy of about eight. The other centre was a compound at Sheik Makonjeni's village headed by Mrs Meriam Amazi, the wife of a xylophone player, who had assembled several young women to play mangolongondo. It is not unusual for women to perform on log xylophones in this cultural area.
One of the most important Yao musicians of the late 20th century is the blind bangwe player and singer Chitenje Tambala (Malamusi, 1990). Tambala was born around 1922 at Kamwetsa village on the western shore of Lake Malawi. He performs mostly chantefables, long narrative texts sung to the accompaniment of his bangwe played in the mokhwacha technique, in which he strikes all seven strings of his bangwe at the same time with the index finger of his right hand, while the fingers of his left hand are placed in between the seven strings in order to dampen strings to produce chords (fig.5). Conforming to Yao tradition, there is a strong tendency in Chitenje's music to use a drone.
One of the oldest pre-Islamic traditions among the Yao is chindimba, an entertainment genre in which a percussion beam of the same name strikes a five-stroke, 12-pulse time-line pattern taught with the mnemonic phrase wankwangu ali koswe (my husband is a rat). Chindimba is performed at beer-drinking parties; formerly it was also associated with funerals (Kubik and others, 1987, p.34).
Another important entertainment dance is m'bwiza, performed with accordion, rattle, hoe-blade and a large double-headed drum, originating in Mozambique, coming to Mangochi district from Vila Cabral (Luchinga). The most outstanding performer in 1983 was Jonas Chapola (b 1933) at Malamya village north of Makanjila (Kubik and Malamusi, 1987). On festive occasions one can also see in Chiyao (Yao) language areas performances of the military-style beni dance, imported from Tanzania, and now found primarily in the area of chiefs Mponda and Nankumba.
Malawi, §1: Main musical style areas
Essential elements of this population cluster arrived in central Malawi before the 13th century, migrating supposedly from a zone west of Lake Tanganyika, roughly within northern Katanga (Pachai, 1973, p.4; Phillipson, 1977, p.230). The people who founded the historical Maravi empire gradually spread out across the most diverse landscapes. Those who settled along the western shore of Lake Malawi became known as Nyanja (the lake people), and those who populated the high plateau areas are sometimes referred to as Chipeta. The nyau or gule wa nkulu (the big dance) secret masked society is particularly important among the Chewa. Social scientist Alifeyo B. Chilivumbo (1972) has called this institution the nerve centre of the Chewa people. Numerous researchers have worked on nyau since the 1950s, among them John Gwengwe (1965), Antonio Rita Ferreira (1968), J.M. Schoffeleers and I. Linden (1972), Kubik and M. Malamusi (1987) and K.N. Phiri (1982; 1983).
Among the Chewa, nyau is also referred to in some parts of Malawi, especially in the south, as gule wa Achipeta to distinguish it from the stylistically different gule wa Chimang'anja. A masked dance performance in this area often takes place on the occasion of chizangala, a last commemorative performance with masks for a deceased member of the secret society (fig.6) Chizangala corresponds with bona or chikumbutso (commemoration) in areas further south.
In this cultural area the term nyau is semi-secret and not normally used in public by the members of the society. One particular chizangala documented in 1987 took place to commemorate Chief (Mfumu) Miyani a year after his death, and the election of a new Miyani chief. The former chief was an important member of the association. The masked performance began at night, with a period of rest in the early morning, then continuing through the next day. Large quantities of millet beer were brewed for the occasion and brought to the bwalo (dance place) to be received by Chief Malili. Different masks appeared in the late afternoon. The onlookers formed a large circle, with the women, in symbolic Chewa fashion, standing in the east, and the group of men in the west.
The drums accompanying the dance were up against a stand, and included tete (with tuning wax in the middle of its skin), mbalule (a drum characterized by its cut-out sections along the sides of the body), two mipanje and one gunda (large, low-sounding drum). Drums were played by initiated men, and both men and women sang. This masked dance accompanied a coming-out ceremony of initiated girls called chingondo, in characteristic body paint and head decoration. This performance at Mbingwa I village concluded before sunset with the appearance of a 4 m long, 2 m high animal mask, called chilembwe, operated by two men hiding inside, demonstrating masterful coordination during their actions.
Malawi, §1: Main musical style areas
The Ngoni introduced two musical bow traditions to northern Malawi. The mtyangala (mouth bow), the more common of the two, is played exclusively by women. It has also spread across Lake Malawi, where it is known among the Wakisi and other peoples in the south-west. Very rare, if not extinct, is the other type of musical bow introduced by the Jere Ngoni, the ugubu (also gubu and gubo). The instrument, a gourd-resonated, unbraced musical bow, up to 1·4 m long, is identical to Zulu and Swazi models, except that the stave of the northern Malawi ugubu is made of bamboo. It is played in a vertical position.
Many older traditions among the Tumbuka have survived, such as mitungu, female initiation music performed with pots and other percussion instruments, and vimbuza, a healing dance. Some of these have been modified under the influence of the Christian missions or revived in new contexts. Considerable research has been carried out on vimbuza by Chilivumbo (1972) and Boston Soko (1984). Vimbuza is a generic term for both psychosomatic disorders and the dance performed to cure them. It is directed by a ng'anga ya vimbuza (doctor of the vimbuza). Vimbuza can afflict a person suddenly without apparent cause. If vimbuza is suspected, then the patient is advised to perform the vimbuza dance to obtain relief. The patient wears a particular dance costume, usually a skirt of fibre bound around the hips, and an additional cloth bound around the waist up to the stomach. Iron pellet bells are attached to the patient's left leg. Men often wear a special headdress made of bird feathers and animal skin. The dance is accompanied by ng'oma and mohambo drums (Kubik and others, 1987, pp.79–83). Under the guidance of the ng'anga ya vimbuza, the patient may dance all night without speaking to anyone, finally falling into a deep sleep. The ceremony may be repeated. Vimbuza is also known under several other names, such as virombo, mphanda, kachekuru and fumuzapasi (Kubik and others, 1982, p.146).
Vimbuza and other dance genres have been used in the therapeutic activities of contemporary Tumbuka prophets who emerged as a nativistic reaction to Christian teachings, incorporating Christian-inspired practices and ideas in to their world-view. The most famous nchimi (healer, prophet) also known as nchimi ya zinchimi (prophet of all prophets) was B. Chikanga Chunda who originally operated out of Thete village in Rumphi district. In the early 1960s Chikanga, still a young man, was assisted by a well-organized team, and thousands of people were attracted, particularly from Tanzania, to his domicile. Most visitors had been accused by their home communities of witchcraft practice and forced to see Chikanga for verification. In addition, people suffering from physical and psychological problems flocked to Chikanga, seeking a cure. Chikanga and his assistants created a vast repertory of songs rooted in Tumbuka harmonic patterns (with a clear Christian influence) for use during his healing sessions. Chikanga received his clients individually, always with uninterrupted singing in the background. His personnel included a choir leader who coordinated the visitors' participation. Chikanga's activities, suppressed by both Christian missions and government administration, were restudied by M. Malamusi, L. Malamusi and Kubik in 1987.
The Tonga were an important resource for migrant labour from the earliest stages of European penetration into Nyasaland. Since 1982, approximately 4000 Tonga labourers were employed annually by European farmers in the Shire highlands; others were among the earliest migrant labourers to southern Africa and the Copperbelt in Zambia. In World War I a considerable number of Tonga were recruited as soldiers. The style and form of British military parades, called malipenga (bugles), inspired the imagination of youths in Tongaland soon after World War I, originating in the area of Nkhata Bay. When members of the King's African Rifles returned from the war, young boys who saw military parades imitated the brass bands with home-made instruments. They made bugles from long gourds with a spider's-nest mirliton attached to the end hole, thus producing a type of kazoo. Military-type drums were adopted from a parallel development of military burlesques known in many areas of Malawi and Zambia as mganda. Malipenga soon spread from Tongaland to the neighbouring Chitumbuka (Tumbuka)-speaking areas. There it became a tradition with membership rules and prescribed internal hierarchy. Up to 50 men participate in a malipenga parade. The dancers dress in shorts and stockings, and most are equipped with walking sticks as they dance with calculated mannerisms.
Malipenga, mganda and related men's activities also reflect the culture of women. Chiwoda, a women's dance of the northern Lake Malawi area, is another example of the Africanization of Western military music. Another military-related performance genre by Tumbuka women is visekese, drawing on similar sources during World War I. Sociologically, it is a creative response by females to men's parade dancing. Visekese’s social function is analogous to chiwoda, although its form, style and instrumentation are different.
Visekese is performed with raft rattles also referred to as visekese. These rattles are made by women from the stalks of a strong grass called sekera. For the construction of a raft rattle, many stalks are tightly joined and plaited around three cross-sticks, each about 1 cm in diameter. The flat, hollow space that is created is then filled with small red grains from the katumbwe shrub; visekese are filled with maize grains. The rattles are played by rocking them from one hand to the other; both hands hold it firmly, and the left and right thumb tap the rattle's surface. The women form a circle, each holding a rattle; in the centre are two dancers. The music is organized in alternation between two lead singers and chorus responding in two-part pentatonic harmony. The sound pattern produced by the rattles represents the use of cymbals in military-style marching bands, reinterpreted to such an extent, however, that a shuffling swing rhythm results. Raft rattles were probably known in northern Malawi long before the rise of this dance. They are widely distributed throughout East Africa. New to visekese dance was the use of an indigenous instrument to portray a foreign, fashionable instrument beyond the purchasing power of the rural communities. Thus, the sound of cymbals of military parades was recreated.
Malawi, §1: Main musical style areas
The Songwe river is only a nominal border between Malawi and Tanzania. The Ngonde who settled between the North Rukuru and Songwe rivers are closely related to the Nyakyusa in Tanzania. Culturally different from the Tumbuka, Ngonde use musical instruments such as the trough zither and cylindro-conical drums with cord lacing that are prominent in areas further north, in western Tanzania up to Lake Victoria.
When a Swahili Arab named Mlozi set up a trading base at Karonga about 1880, the relative isolation of the Ngonde and Nyakyusa was broken. The presence of mangolongondo (log xylophones) among the Nyakyusa and Ngonde, absent among all neighbours, is an indication of a late 19th-century import through trading contacts.
The tradition of indingala has made Ngonde musical culture widely known in Malawi. Historically, this music was played with drums and without singing on the occasion of the death of a very important chief. Indingala was the name of the biggest drum used for transmitting news of the death. Nowadays, indingala is played on various occasions, with three cylindro-conical drums carried by young men while dancers form two front rows, boys and girls on opposite sides. This modern version of indingala became widely known after Malawi's independence in 1964; it was promoted in this form at festivals and political rallies by Dr H. Kamuzu Banda's government which reacted to the dance's prohibition under previous colonial regimes. In its older form, it often instigated violence, according to Chief Kyungu's testimony (Kubik and others, 1982, pp.148–9).
After World War II a wave of musical innovations occurred in schools and churches and in popular dance. Staged performances became popular under names such as makwaya (choirs) and konseti or kamsoloti (concerts), the latter sometimes involving tap dancing. The radio, cinema and gramophone introduced popular American, South African and other musical styles to Malawi. The ease in communication and increased labour migration to the south and to the Copperbelt were now major factors that contributed to the rapid spread of distinct guitar-based styles throughout southern Africa: sabasaba, sinjonjo, vula matambo and other dance genres characterized the 1950s. The acoustic guitar, the banjo (Kubik, 1989) and the accordion became the basis of new dance musics. Ballroom dancing became a fashion during the 1940s (Malamusi, 1994, p.57) and is remembered as the jore dance, described as dansi yogwilana-gwilana (dance with men and women holding each other).
War veterans returning from Burma, including James Kachamba, father of the eminent Kachamba brothers (see Kachamba, Daniel), had a share in the rise of the new traditions. Among the first Malawian guitarists and banjoists to be recorded and popularized on gramophone records were labour migrants such as Banti Chapola who was recorded by Tracey in Harare in 1948. By the mid-1940s distinctive guitar styles arose in several parts of the country. Chileka near Blantyre was one focal point researched in great detail by M. Malamusi (1994); interviews were conducted with guitar veterans such as Mofolo Chilim'bwalo, Soza Molesi, Deko Sato and others. Another focal point was Zomba, where the Paseli Brothers Band gained momentum in the late 1940s. Like other early groups, the Paseli Brothers were first recorded by Tracey in Harare for the Gallotone Company. Their song texts commented on topical social concerns. Like other early dance bands, the instrumentation of the Paseli Brothers was guitar, banjo, drum, rattles and a hoe-blade used to strike a time-line pattern.
Popular dance musics of the late 1940s spread rapidly even to remote areas due to the impact of rising mass media: 78 r.p.m. gramophone records and radio broadcasting. During the 1950s the Federal Broadcasting Corporation, based in Salisbury, Rhodesia, made recordings in Nyasaland, and broadcast from Lusaka. Only in 1959 did the FBC establish a transmitter in Zomba that was later transferred to Blantyre. This new branch of the FBC carried out its own local recording programme, recording mostly school choirs. These recordings are preserved on 78 r.p.m. shellac discs at the Malawi Broadcasting Corporation Archives in Blantyre-Chichiri.
In contrast to the radio station, Indian-owned business enterprises in Blantyre-Limbe began to record popular music that they knew would sell. Most of these shellac discs have not survived; only a few exist in private collections. One of the most famous groups recorded during the 1950s was the Ndiche Brothers Band. Ndiche Mwarare (d 1991), born in Ntcheu, began playing guitar in 1953. By 1958 he was nationally known for his hauyani (Hawaiian) style of guitar playing, using a glass bottle ‘slider’ in his left hand and finger-picks on the thumb and index finger of his right hand. During the time of struggle for independence of Malawi, he often accompanied Banda, the future president, to political rallies. He was employed by the Malawi Broadcasting Corporation from 1965 until his death.
In the 1970s and 80s popular urban dance music was dominated by night-club bands using electrically amplified instrumentation, mostly emulating current African popular styles from South Africa, Zimbabwe, East Africa and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and adaptations of reggae. In rural areas travelling bands of young musicians with home-made banjos or guitars countered the decline of live musical performance in the 1990s with public bars dominated by commercial cassettes played from powerful loudspeakers and juke boxes. One remarkable group of adolescents in the 1980s was the Fumbi Jazz Band.
In the 1980s and early 1990s, there were four composers and performers of popular music who transcended the imitation of foreign models and developed distinctly personal styles: Daniel Kachamba, blind singer-guitarist Allan Namoko (Mmeya, 1983; Kubik and others, 1987, p.29), blind banjoist Michael Yekha and multi-instrumentalist Donald Kachamba.
Malawi is among the most thoroughly documented countries of Africa with regard to music and dance. Early cylinder recordings of Ngoni songs are kept at the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, and accounts by travellers and colonial administrators go back to the second half of the 19th century. Systematic ethnomusicological research, however, began only after World War II.
Hugh Tracey undertook three recording tours into Nyasaland (1949, 1950 and 1958), recording extensively among the Chewa in the central region, the Mang'anja in the southern region, Chitumbuka-speaking people of northern Malawi and among the Yao of the western lake shore. These recordings were published in the AMA Sound of Africa series (Tracey, 1973). He also documented historical traditions such as praise-songs for chiefs and military and funeral songs of the Ngoni. In 1967 Maurice Djenda and Gerhard Kubik undertook a survey of musical traditions, and the collection of their audio and video materials is archived at the Musikethnologische Abteilung, Museum für Völkerkunde, Berlin, and at the Learning Resources Centre, University of Malawi, Zomba. The research team of Kubik, Moya A. Malamusi, Lidiya Malamusi and Donald Kachamba carried out an intensive study of initiation (jando, lupanda, chinamwali cha akazi) in the nyau masked secret society, children's games, nthano (storytelling), dzidapi (riddling) and music-dance education in rural areas of the southern region (1982–4).
The establishment of the Oral Literature Research Programme at Chileka, Blantyre District, by M.A. Malamusi (1989) included a systematic, continuous field research programme covering music and oral literature in Blantyre, Mwanza, Chikwawa, Mulanje, Mangochi, Thyolo, Machinga, Chiradzulu, Ntcheu and Nsanje districts. A collection of tape recordings, photographic documentation and objects is preserved in the programme's ethnographic museum. Several publications have resulted from this programme.
Y.B. Abdallah: Chiikala kao Wayao (Zomba, 1919; Eng. trans., 1919); repr. together as The Yaos/Chiikala kao Wayao, Missionary Researches and Travels, xxv (London, 1973)
E.T. Chakanza: ‘Native Songs from Nyasaland’, Journal of African Society, xx (1921), 116–20
G.T. Nurse: ‘Popular Songs and National Identity in Malawi’, AfM, iii/3 (1964), 101–6
J.W. Gwengwe: Kukula ndi mwambo (Limbe, Malawi, 1965)
G.T. Nurse: ‘The Installation of Inkosi ya Makosi Gomani III’, AfM, iv/1 (1966–7)
A.R. Ferreira: ‘The Nyau Brotherhood among the Mozambique Cewa’, South African Journal of Science, lxiv (1968), 20–24
G. Kubik: ‘Ethnomusicological Research in Southern Parts of Malawi’, Society of Malawi Journal, xxi (1968), 20–32
G.T. Nurse: ‘Ideophonic Aspects of some Nyanja Drum Names’, AfM, iv/3 (1969), 40–43
G.T. Nurse: ‘Cewa Concepts of Musical Instruments’, AfM, iv/3 (1969), 32–6
A.B. Chilivumbo: ‘Vimbuza or Mashawe: a Mystic Therapy’, AfM, v/2 (1972), 6–9
J.M. Schoffeleers and I. Linden: ‘The Resistance of the Nyau Society to the Roman Catholic Missions in Colonial Malawi’, The Historical Study of African Religion, eds. T.O. Ranger and I.N. Kimambo (London, 1972), 252–76
B. Pachai, ed.: The History of the Nation (London, 1973)
H. Tracey: Catalogue of the Sound of Africa Recordings (Roodeport, 1973)
J.M. Schoffeleers: ‘The Nyau Societies: our Present Understanding’, The Society of Malawi Journal, xxix (1976), 59–68
D.W. Phillipson: The Later Prehistory of Eastern and Southern Africa (London, 1977)
W. van Zanten: ‘The Equidistant Heptatonic Scale of the Asena in Malawi’, AfM, vi/1 (1980), 107–25
G. Kubik and others: Ostafrika, i (Leipzig, 1982)
K.N. Phiri: ‘The Historiography of Nyau’, Kalulu, iii (1982), 55–8
E. Muyenza and M. Strumpf: ‘The Ngoma Dance of Central Malawi’, Baraza, i (1983)
K.N. Phiri: ‘Some Changes in the Matrilineal Family System among the Chewa of Malawi since the Nineteenth Century’, Journal of African History, xxiv (1983), 157–74
B.J. Soko: Stylistique et messages dans le vimbuza: essai d'étude ethnolinguistique des chants de possession chez les Ngoni-Tumbuka du Malawi, 1900–1963 (diss., U. of Paris, 1984)
G. Kubik with M.A. Malamusi: Nyau: Maskenbünde im südlichen Malawi (Vienna, 1987)
G. Kubik and others: Malawian Music: a Framework for Analysis (Zomba, Malawi, 1987)
G. Kubik: ‘The Southern African Periphery: Banjo Traditions in Zambia and Malawi’, World of Music, xxxi (1989), 3–29
M.A. Malamusi: ‘Nthano Chantefables and Songs performed by the Bangwe Player Chitenje Tambala’, South African Journal of African Languages, x (1990), 222–38
M.A. Malamusi: ‘Samba Ng'oma Eight: the Drum-Chime of Mario Sabuneti’, AfM, vii/1 (1991), 55–71
M.A. Malamusi: ‘Thunga la ngororombe: the Panpipe Dance Group of Sakha Bulaundi’, AfM, vii/2 (1992), 85–107
A. Tracey: ‘Kambazithe Makolekole and his Valimba Group: a Glimpse of the Technique of the Sena Xylophone’, AfM, vii/1 (1991), 82–104
A. Tracey: ‘Some Dance Steps for the Nyanga Panpipe Dance’, AfM, vii/2 (1992), 108–18
G. Kubik: Makisi, Nyau, Mapiko: Maskentraditionen im Bantusprachigen Afrika (Munich, 1993)
M. Strumpf and K. Phwandaphwanda, eds.: Readings in Malawian Music: a Collection of Previously Published Articles on Malawian Music (Zomba, Malawi, 1993)
A. Thorold: ‘Metamorphoses of the Yao Muslims’, Muslim Identity and Social Change in Sub-Saharan Africa, ed. L. Brenner (London, 1993), 79–90
M.A. Malamusi: ‘Rise and Development of a Chileka Guitar Style in the 1950s’, Kubik Festschrift (1994), 7–72
M.A. Malamusi: ‘Konzert der Kambazithe Makolekole Valimba Band’, Festival traditioneller Musik '95: Afrika-Süd (1995), 22–5
Opeka Nyimbo, Museum für Völkerkunde, Musikethnologische Abteilung, Museum Collection MC 15 (1989) [incl. notes by G. Kubik and M.A. Malamusi]
African Guitar: Solo Fingerstyle Guitar Music, Composers and Performers of Congo/Zaire Uganda, Central African Republic, Malawi, Namibia and Zambia, videotape (Stefan Grossman, New Jersey, 1995) [field recordings 1966–93 by G. Kubik]