Bumbling boo boo
We saw it in the paper and thought:
that has to be an April Fool's prank
"Bach in a
Boubou"
For those of you
who don't know, a boubou, or actually bouba is an elegant piece of clothing that
women wear in Senegal and Mali (in particular) that is large, luxurious, and
tends to slide off one shoulder at all times. It is sexy, demure and practical
all at once. So what does that have to do with
Bach?
My stomach was
asking the same thing at the end of a tortuous "recital" of Bach fugues for
organ in every minor key you could think of, accompanied by djembe drum and a
slide show of snapshots of somebody's trip to the village of Yolof. SNAPSHOTS.
SNAPSHOTS!!!
As if that
was not irritating enough, the program didn;t nothing to warn us of the fact
that our misadventures were not in fact guided by some ill-gotten musical
theory, but rather was an insipid one-to-one comparison to Bach's life
and...contemporary Senegalese djalle guilds (aka griots). A griot or more
elegantly, djalle, is a historian/philosopher/musician/dancer/singer who is
usually under the patronage of one wealthy (or important) family in their town
and/or neighborhood. it is their job NEVER to forget, and if need be, remember
ornately so as to make the customer look gooder than good. You know, Bach kinda
did that?
And these folks
are typically only paid with goods, not cash. Oh Bach sometimes got grain or
firewood for his
playing.
Bach also was at
all the same important events that one would hire a griot to perform at:
weddings, naming ceremonies, funerals. of course, he had a
church.
INSIPID!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
(here, i would subject you to an audio file of the madness, but i have gotten
out of the habit of carrying my ethnography gear with me no matter where i go.
in this land of lakes, actually i'm in the finger lakes, no sweet or satly cream
rising to to this top, i should always have my
gear)
This, thankfully,
was a short concert, what with the blasts of drum solo on the djembe with its
head improperly pulled (ok, that's the trained dancer snob in me coming out) and
the Ghanaian dance interlude by well-meaning college students, enough was simply
enough.
My small child,
along with my pal Ritsu we my co-sufferers. Having had enough, by the
penultimate selection, my son began shout, with his hands over his ears, "I
can't take any more of
this!"
Did I mention that
we were in an interfaith church in one of the side chapels?
This is funny, but oh so
not funny. It was a fundraiser for the library that was shown for only two of
the 50 slides.
SO the
mostly white folks in the room got to show their hipness and world weariness and
save an African nation from illiteracy in 45 minutes, never mind that Black
people in this town LITERALLY feel like they cannot shop downtown. On Fen 18th,
a six year old boy was shoved to the floor for putting candy that he BOUGHT into
his pocket.
But those
darkies in antiquated, authentic, just-like-Bach Africa are going to get some
books. BTW, did you know that Bach liked food at his concerts, too, like the
people of
Yolof?
----
ENOUGH
set
your clocks ahead if you have not already done so. Now, in classic high
negressdom, I will go back to being late since I will no longer be an early
riser.
I still must suss
out just where in the body a chuckle point is
located.
I lost touch with
mine tonight.
Since I
still have to finish my taxes, I better find it
quick.
Though my forays
onto eHarmony have me wondering if someone has made off with my chuckle point
altogether!
And finally, a
shameless plug for some I-Town music: http://www.oculusband.com ---- don't
sleep!
until...
Posted: Sat
- April 3, 2004 at 12:17 AM