Pressing patrons with proverbs: Talking drums at the Tamale markets1
Notes
1Reprinted with permission from Research Review Supplement 9, Institute of African Studies, University of Ghana. Abdullai Seidu, my teacher and the source for this study, is the master drummer for the performing ensemble based at the Center for National Culture in Tamale. He also regularly drums with other ensembles, which have toured internationally. He has been drumming for 40 years and has taught students from around the world. Many thanks go to him and to his ensembles for allowing me to document a number of their performances in 1993 through recordings and photographs.
Acknowledgments also go to the staff of the GILLBT Dagbani Literacy Program in Tamale, under the direction of Hanneke Korten. She and her staff put in a number of hours in transcribing, translating, and checking the Dagbani texts I recorded from Abdullai. Many thanks go to them, especially to Memunatu Musah.
2The seven drum proverbs transcribed in this article represent a portion of about 30 I have collected up to date. My tentative plans are to publish a larger collection of Dagbamba drum proverbs, along with Gonja drum proverbs collected in Daboya, in book and cassette form within a few years. [return]
3These historical genres are more restricted as to who can know them (Oppong 1973:54). [return]
4See Oppong (1973:1316) for a summary of the latter history of the kingdom of Dagbon; see her bibliography for references to fuller histories of the state and people. [return]
5Chernoff (1979) connects this pattern with "a mid-nineteenth century paramount chief of Yendi, Naa Yakuba." He provides an alternate interpretation: "Whatever goes into the hands of the chief has become something dangerous." [return]
6It must be emphasized that often the details of a speech surrogate drummer's "phonology of the drum" are good only for that particular drummer, though a broad framework is shared (Neeley 1994). Other drummers may use variant tones, rhythms, and ways of fitting the syllables into a metric framework. The phonological conclusions drawn here are certain only for the small sample of Abdullai's drumming I have worked with so far. [return]
References
Chernoff, John Miller. 1979. African rhythm and African sensibility. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Chernoff, John Miller. 1980. Master drummers of Dagbon. Volume 2. Rounder Records CD 5046 (liner notes).
Dakubu, M. E. Kropp, and Cathleen Read. 1985. "Language and music in the LuNa drumming of Dagbon: A preliminary study." Papers in Ghanaian Linguistics 5. Legon: Institute of African Studies. 20-31.
Locke, David. 1990. Drum Damba. Crown Point, IN: White Cliffs Media Company.
Neeley, Paul. 1994. "People of the drum of God, come!": Ethnography of a speech surrogate performance paradigm. Dallas: International Museum of Cultures.
Oppong, Christine. 1968. "A note on a Dagomba chief's drummer." Research Review (Legon) IV(2):63-65.
Oppong, Christine. 1969. "A preliminary account of the role and recruitment of drummers in Dagbon." Research Review (Legon) IV(1):38-51.
Oppong, Christine. 1973. Growing up in Dagbon. Accra: Ghana Publishing Corporation.
Tait, D. no date. Dagomba drum histories. Manuscripts. At Institute of African Studies, Legon, University of Ghana.
Wilson, W. A. A. 1972. Dagbani: An introductory course. Typescript. Distributed by Ghana Institute of Linguistics, Literacy, and Bible Translation, Tamale.