Research Catalog

Seeing with music : the lives of three blind African musicians

Title: Seeing with music : the lives of three blind African musicians / Simon Ottenberg.
Author: Ottenberg, Simon.
Publication: Seattle : University of Washington Press, 1996.

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Status	Format	Access	Call Number	Item Location
Request for On-site Use Request Scan How do I pick up this item and when will it be ready?	Text	Request in advance	ML399 .O88 1996	Off-site

Description

xv, 216 pages : illustrations; 25 cm

Summary

In the course of his ongoing study of the aesthetic world of the Limba of Sierra Leone, anthropologist Simon Ottenberg met three men from Wara Wara Bafodea chiefdom who played an instrument called the kututeng, known elsewhere in Africa as the mbira and sometimes in the West as the thumb piano. Each of the three was blind, poor, unmarried, and childless in a society where children bring status and where musicianship is not a standard role for the blind.
Each man's life experiences had influenced the way he performed Kututeng, a traditional but changing form of music. In this book, Ottenberg approaches Limba Kututeng music through the lives of these three musicians - Sayo Kamara, Muctaru Mansaray, and Marehu Mansaray. He looks at their different styles of performance, the social settings in which they play, the meanings of their song texts, and the relationships between their musical form and other Limba arts.
Kututeng music is not an ancient tradition in Limba country, or in Sierra Leone in general, but dates to the early twentieth century. In recent years it has begun to change in response to the popularity of other musical forms in Sierra Leone. Ottenberg shows effectively how these three men have helped reformulate the nature of Kututeng in the capital town of the chiefdom, giving it a new vitality that is consistent with the aesthetic values of the Limba world.

Subject

Bibliography (note)

Contents

Concepts -- The setting -- Sayo Kamara -- Muctaru Mansaray -- Marehu Mansaray -- The world of three kututeng musicians.

ISBN

0295975253 (alk. paper)

LCCN

95049962

OCLC

Owning Institutions

Columbia University Libraries