Country in West Africa. Located on the coast between Senegal and Guinea, it has a population of 1.18 million (2000 estimate) and an area of 36,120 km2.
Guinea-Bissau’s population is diverse, consisting of more than 20 ethnic groups descended from Mande, Fula (FulBe; Fulani) and Senegambian peoples who are now subdivided into the following ethnic groups: Balanta (20%), Fula (20%), Mande (14%), Manjaca (or Mandyak; 7%), Papei (or Papel; 7%), other African groups (15%) and non-African (1%). The official language is Portuguese, but Crioulo (Krioulo, Criolo), a Portuguese-West African Creole language, serves as the primary language.
Approximately 65% of the population are animists, including the Balante, Papei, Manjaca, Diola, Bijago, Nalu and Brame (Burama) peoples. The others, including the Fula, Mande, Beafada (Biafada) and Susu peoples, either are Muslim or practice a syncretic blend of Islam and African traditional religions. Animists are concentrated along the coast and coastal islands, while the Islamicized population is located mostly in the cattle-raising interior.
Guinea-Bissau has been independent since 1974. While its history is a part of the general history of African empire building and the diffusion of diverse indigenous peoples, its last 500 years have been marked by Portuguese colonization. A long war for independence was fought from 1963 to 1974, with Cape Verdeans contributing to the war effort. Indeed, Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde, an island nation located approximately 480 km west of the Senegalese coast, have a shared history in many respects, including a common Portuguese administration and strategic roles in the slave industry. The shared Crioulo language and culture developed as a result of contacts between peoples from the Guinea-Bissau region, Cape Verde and Europe, due primarily to the slave trade.
Due to its many ethnic divisions, Guinea-Bissau’s musical traditions represent the variety of musical styles found across West Africa, reflecting cultural, historical and linguistic affinities with societies beyond its boundaries. Guinea-Bissau may be divided into cultural pattern areas that overlap national borders.
Crioulo music culture, the music of Gionea-Bissau's airwaves and dance halls, is the a feature that unites the country. Because of Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde’s common vernacular and their colonial past, Crioulo musics are heard throughout Guinea-Bissau. These include the morna (poetic, melancholy ballads primarily in minor keys, played at medium tempos and in quadruple metres), the coladeira (upbeat dance music in fast duple metre) and funana (fast quadruple-metre dance music originally performed on accordion and scraper but adapted by commercial bands after 1980).
Some of the Bijagós island people have a social organization that is unusual among African musical cultures, although it is consistent with neighbouring matrilineal coastal forest peoples. In these communities, women may adopt roles usually reserved for men. For example, it is women who play the drums, a rare phenomenon in most folk cultures. Gender role reversals are evident in other customs; women choose their spouses from among the community’s young men, who often present themselves within the context of a dance. They adorn themselves with jewellery, elaborate hairstyles, clothing and make-up, hoping to be chosen by a powerful female. On the surface, it seems that this is a rare instance where courtship roles, music-making and power over reproductive rights are controlled by women instead of men.
In Muslim Guinea-Bissau a special caste of professional musicians called jali (jalis, jalolu, judeu) provides music for many occasions; Griot is the general French name for these specialized musicians, oral historians and poets in West Africa. The jalis have a low social status but are respected for their skill and ability to perform praise-songs, recount long lineages and oral histories, and entertain. They are keen observers and critics of society. These musicians generally accompany themselves on the Kora (plucked bridge-harp), Balo (xylophone), koni (four-string lute), nhanheros (bowed fiddle) and the double-headed hourglass tension drum. The women in families of jali sing and play iron bells or scrapers. The melodic and rhythmic organization of their music has distinctive North African and Arab influences.
Descriptions of animist cultures mention the prevalence of call-and-response structures, complex polyrhythmic organizations and the linkage of music and dance. Polyphonic singing, especially in 3rds, is associated with the coastal animist, while the interior Muslims favour monophonic melodies with ornate embellishments.
Music and dance, whether rooted in traditional or contemporary forms, are an integral part of everyday life for most people of Guinea-Bissau. There are special songs for almost every aspect of life, including rituals, praise, work and play, and for recounting oral history. Music and dance can be both an expression of spirituality and a catalyst of religious fervour. Among animists, trance and spirit possessions are often part of musical rituals and induced in part by intense spiritual receptivity paired with rhythmic drumming, hand-clapping, singing and agitated dance. A dance may be considered an offering to the spirits, much like a prayer. Rites of passages (births, puberty, marriage, succession and funeral ceremonies) are marked with music and dance, as are fertility rituals, yearly religious and agricultural celebrations, and ceremonies performed by secret societies and associations of hunters and warriors.
While nearly everyone sings and dances in various contexts, Guinea-Bissau’s tribal societies are divided into musical groups along lines of age and gender, and each group has distinctive repertories.
Ethnographic descriptions say little about musical structures, yet descriptions of dances are plentiful. Most dances are performed in a circle by a peer group (i.e. all women, all young men etc.). Common in dances among the coastal animists are totemic representations of various significant animals, especially steer, water buffalo, hippopotami, frogs and fish. Traditional dance apparel in Guinea-Bissau is among the world’s most elaborate and beautiful. Typical are costumes made of dried grass, large carved or woven masks, and headdresses made from palm-leaves, especially in the Bijagós islands. Records from the colonial era often mention a type of female dance that they considered ‘lewd and lascivious’, which was characterized by a rapid gyration of the hips and buttocks (often accentuated by a sash), outstretched arms, minimal upper body movement and a backwards tilt of the head. This dance was performed by one or more soloists accompanied by an ensemble of women who sang call-and-response songs and provided hand-clapping. Cape Verde batuko probably has its origins in similar dance traditions.
Although there are numerous instruments used in Guinea-Bissau, the most prevalent source through which music is produced is the human body; singing and hand-clapping are present in most music performances. Rows of jingles attached to dancers’ bodies and musical instruments provide another important source of musical sound. There are many types of indigenous fiddles and lutes, harps, drums, xylophones, side-blown trumpets made from wood, animal horns or gourds, bullroarers, mirlitons, whistles, iron bells, rattles and flutes. Of these, several stand out as widespread and important. These include the large bombólon (slit-drum), which is sometimes two metres in length. It is made from a hollowed-out tree trunk and is played with two heavy, wooden sticks. Since this drum can be heard for long distances and is used as a signal to announce deaths or sound an alarm, it is sometimes referred to as the ‘telegrafo indigena’. In addition to the slit-drum, there are many types of wooden membranophones in various shapes and sizes, including a long, thin drum sometimes called the gilá, which is carried with a shoulder harness. Drum ensembles of at least three instruments of varying sizes are common. For example, the Papeis use single-headed wooden drums called ondame (largest), tchânguere (middle-sized) and peruto (smallest). They are played with one stick and one open hand.
The balafon (balo, balfou, bálá, balafom) gourd-resonated wooden xylophone, another common instrument, has between 16 and 24 slabs and is tuned to an equiheptatonic scale. It is played with two wooden mallets and is used as both a solo and an ensemble instrument by the Mande people throughout the Western Sudan area.
Variations on the fiddle are widespread. Calande is the Crioulo name for a commonly found bowed or plucked fiddle. It is made of a dried calabash cut in half and covered with a skin. It has a neck and one or more gut strings. Other names for this instrument are nhanheros (Fula), molo, riti and cimboa.
Oval- or boat-shaped lutes with three, four or five strings are found throughout West Africa, including Guinea-Bissau. These lutes have wooden resonating boxes covered with animal skins and are about 40–45 cm long and 10 cm wide. Instruments of this type have many names, including koonting, konting, kontigo, koni, viola, xalam, toncrum and haddu. These instruments usually have a rattling device on the neck that vibrates when the instrument is played, adding an additional timbre.
Instruments from the bridge-harp family, such as the kora, are prevalent in Guinea-Bissau among the Mande people. Scholars believe that the kora originated in the area that is now Guinea-Bissau, in or around Kansala, capital of the Kaabu empire. These large bridge-harps usually have from 18 to 21 strings stretched between a large calabash resonating chamber and a long curving neck. They have several heptatonic tuning systems involving both tones and semitones and are used to accompany singing and as solo instruments. Smaller harps with seven or eight strings called simbing, simbingo and bolon are also widespread.
Popular musics from Guinea-Bissau have been influenced by diverse musical sources, including Cape Verde, other African nations, the Caribbean and indigenous traditions. Popular recording artists use conventional Western instruments, such as the guitar, drum kit, keyboard and bass guitar in their music, in addition to indigenous instruments. Popular Guinea-Bissauan musicians include the band Tabanka Djaz (led by Mikas Cabral), Ramiro Naka, Kaba Mané and Sidonio Pais who have earned an international following, performing a local music called goumbé (also gumbé), as well as the aforementioned styles. Other popular recording artists include Manecas Costa, N’Kassa Cobra, Dulce Maria Neves and Tino Trimo who made a guitar-based dance music called kambalocho famous.
A. Gomes: ‘Notas sobres a música indigena da Guiné’, Boletim Cultural da Guiné Portuguesa, v (1950), 411–24
F.R.R. Quintino: ‘Música e dança na Guiné Portuguesa’, Boletim Cultural da Guiné Portuguesa, xviii (1963), 551–70
L. Jessup: The Mandinka Balafon: an Introduction with Notation for Teaching (La Mesa, CA, 1983)
E. Charry: Musical Thought, History, and Practice among the Mande of West Africa (diss., Princeton U., 1992)
R.A. Lobban and P.K. Mendy: Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Guinea-Bissau (Lanham, MD, 3/1997)
K. Mané: Best of Kaba Mané, Mélodie CD 08561-2
R. Naka: Les tam-tams noirs, Naka Production CD NAK 001
T. Djaz: Speranca, Lusafrica [Goumbé music from Guinea-Bissau]
SUSAN HURLEY-GLOWA