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Güiro Players
The güiro () is a Puerto Rican percussion instrument consisting of an open-ended, hollow gourd with parallel notches cut in one side. It is played by rubbing a stick or tines (see photo) along the notches to produce a ratchet sound. The güiro is commonly used in Puerto Rican, Cuban and other forms of Latin American music, and plays a key role in the typical rhythm section of important genres like son, trova and salsa. Playing the güiro usually requires both long and short sounds, made by scraping up and down in long or short strokes. The güiro, like the maracas, is often played by a singer. It is closely related to the Cuban guayo, Dominican güira, and Haitian graj which are made of metal. Other instruments similar to the güiro are the Colombian guacharaca, the Brazilian reco-reco, the quijada (cow jawbone) and the frottoir (French) or fwotwa (French Creole) ( washboard). Etymology In the Arawakan language, a language of the indigenous people of Latin America and sp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Musical Instrument Museum (Phoenix)
The Musical Instrument Museum (MIM) is located in Phoenix, Arizona. Opened in April 2010, it is the largest museum of its type in the world. The collection of over 15,000 musical instruments and associated objects includes examples from nearly 200 countries and territories, representing every inhabited continent. Some larger countries such as the United States, Mexico, India, China, and Brazil have multiple displays with subsections for different types of ethnic, folk, and tribal music. Overview The Museum was founded by Robert J. Ulrich, former CEO and chairman of Target Corporation. A collector of African art and a world museum enthusiast, Ulrich and his friend Marc Felix originated the idea after a visit to the Musical Instrument Museum in Brussels, Belgium. The design of the museum benefited as well from the consultation of the Musée de la Musique in Paris modernised in 1997. The contemporary building covers approximately 200,000 square-feet, with two floors of gallerie ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Güira
The güira () is a percussion instrument from the Dominican Republic used as a percussion instrument in merengue music, merengue, bachata (music), bachata, and to a lesser extent, other genres such as cumbia. It is made of a metal sheet (commonly steel) and played with a stiff brush, thus being similar to the Haitian graj (a perforated metal cylinder scraped with a stick) and the Cuban guayo (metal scraper) and Puerto Rico, Puerto Rican güiro (gourd scraper). Güira, guayo and güiro all have a function akin to that of the indigenous native maracas or the trap-kit's Hi-hat (instrument), hi-hat, namely providing a complementary beat. Performers on the güira are referred to as ''güireros'' and in merengue típico ensembles they often co-lead percussion sections along with tambora-playing ''tamboreros'', due to the significance of their African-derived interlocking rhythms in providing a basic musical foundation for dance. Usage The güira is most often found in merengue típico ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Berom People
The Berom (sometimes also spelt as Birom) is the largest autochthonous ethnic group in Plateau State, central Nigeria. Covering about four local government areas, which include Jos North, Jos South, Barkin Ladi (Gwol) and Riyom, Berom are also found in some southern Kaduna State local government areas like Fadan Karshe with Berom settlers tracing their origins to Za'ang (Zawan) a Berom district on the Jos Plateau. They emigrated during the British Colonial Government of Nigeria. The Berom speak the Berom language, which belongs to the Plateau branch of Benue–Congo, a subfamily of the large Niger–Congo language family. It is not related to the Hausa language (which belongs to the Afro-Asiatic family) or other Afro-Asiatic languages of Plateau State, which are Chadic languages. Culture The Berom people have a rich cultural heritage. They celebrate the Nzem Berom festival annually in March or April. Other festivals include Nzem Tou Chun (worongchun) and Wusal Berom. Its ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kay Williamson
Kay Williamson (January 26, 1935, Hereford, United Kingdom – January 3, 2005, Brazil), born Ruth Margaret Williamson, was a linguist who specialised in the study of African languages, particularly those of the Niger Delta in Nigeria, where she lived for nearly fifty years. She has been called "The Mother of Nigerian Linguistics" and is also notable for proposing the Pan-Nigerian alphabet. Early life Professor Kay Williamson was born in Hereford, England, where she lived for the first 18 years of her life. She was the eldest of six children. Her father, Alfred Henry Williamson, also known as Harry, was the founder of Wyevale Nurseries. Her father and mother, Harriett Eileen Williamson, turned the Wyevale nurseries into one of the largest garden center chains in Europe. Williamson was educated at Hereford girls' high school and St Hilda's College, Oxford, where she took a BA in English in 1956, followed by an MA in 1960. Career Her many publications include a grammar an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
List Of Musical Instruments Of Cameroon
This article is a list of traditional musical instruments in Cameroon, based primarily on the research of Roger Blench (2009). Idiophones Idiophones of Cameroon include percussion instruments, untuned idiophones, tuned idiophones (xylophones), concussion instruments, and other instruments. Percussion * Slit gongs: historically used for long-distance communication, and often mimic tones in languages. Common throughout much of Africa, the tropical Americas, and Oceania. Called ''egyʉ̂k'' in Ejagham, and also played by the Oroko people and by Tunen speakers. Untuned idiophones *Struck plaques **Lithophones: played by the Mofu of northern Cameroon, and also in Central Nigeria and throughout the world. Women of the Noni and other nearby ethnic groups in Bui Division play flat lithophones. The Noni lithophone consists of a ''ncéw'' (large flat stone) struck by a pair of ''ncùy'' (smaller stones). **Struck iron plaque: a pair of sticks is used to strike a triangular plaque ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cameroon
Cameroon (; french: Cameroun, ff, Kamerun), officially the Republic of Cameroon (french: République du Cameroun, links=no), is a country in west-central Africa. It is bordered by Nigeria to the west and north; Chad to the northeast; the Central African Republic to the east; and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon and the Republic of the Congo to the south. Its coastline lies on the Bight of Biafra, part of the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean. Due to its strategic position at the crossroads between West Africa and Central Africa, it has been categorized as being in both camps. Its nearly 27 million people speak 250 native languages. Early inhabitants of the territory included the Sao civilisation around Lake Chad, and the Baka hunter-gatherers in the southeastern rainforest. Portuguese explorers reached the coast in the 15th century and named the area ''Rio dos Camarões'' (''Shrimp River''), which became ''Cameroon'' in English. Fulani soldiers founded the Adamawa Emirate in th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aztec
The Aztecs () were a Mesoamerican culture that flourished in central Mexico in the post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl language and who dominated large parts of Mesoamerica from the 14th to the 16th centuries. Aztec culture was organized into city-states ('' altepetl''), some of which joined to form alliances, political confederations, or empires. The Aztec Empire was a confederation of three city-states established in 1427: Tenochtitlan, city-state of the Mexica or Tenochca; Texcoco; and Tlacopan, previously part of the Tepanec empire, whose dominant power was Azcapotzalco. Although the term Aztecs is often narrowly restricted to the Mexica of Tenochtitlan, it is also broadly used to refer to Nahua polities or peoples of central Mexico in the prehispanic era, as well as the Spanish colonial era (1521–1821). The definitions of Aztec and Aztecs ha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area and 20% of its land area.Sayre, April Pulley (1999), ''Africa'', Twenty-First Century Books. . With billion people as of , it accounts for about of the world's human population. Africa's population is the youngest amongst all the continents; the median age in 2012 was 19.7, when the worldwide median age was 30.4. Despite a wide range of natural resources, Africa is the least wealthy continent per capita and second-least wealthy by total wealth, behind Oceania. Scholars have attributed this to different factors including geography, climate, tribalism, colonialism, the Cold War, neocolonialism, lack of democracy, and corruption. Despite this low concentration of wealth, recent economic expansion and the large and young population make Afric ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
South America
South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southern subregion of a single continent called America. South America is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east by the Atlantic Ocean; North America and the Caribbean Sea lie to the northwest. The continent generally includes twelve sovereign states: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay, and Venezuela; two dependent territories: the Falkland Islands and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands; and one internal territory: French Guiana. In addition, the ABC islands of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Ascension Island (dependency of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha, a British Overseas Territory), Bouvet Island ( dependency ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Calabash
Calabash (; ''Lagenaria siceraria''), also known as bottle gourd, white-flowered gourd, long melon, birdhouse gourd, New Guinea bean, Tasmania bean, and opo squash, is a vine grown for its fruit. It can be either harvested young to be consumed as a vegetable, or harvested mature to be dried and used as a utensil, container, or a musical instrument. When it is fresh, the fruit has a light green smooth skin and white flesh. Calabash fruits have a variety of shapes: they can be huge and rounded, small and bottle-shaped, or slim and serpentine, and they can grow to be over a metre long. Rounder varieties are typically called calabash gourds. The gourd was one of the world's first cultivated plants grown not primarily for food, but for use as containers. The bottle gourd may have been carried from Asia to Africa, Europe, and the Americas in the course of human migration, or by seeds floating across the oceans inside the gourd. It has been proven to have been globally domesticated (an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crescentia Cujete
''Crescentia cujete'', commonly known as the calabash tree, is a species of flowering plant native to the Americas, that is grown in Africa, Central America, South America, the West Indies and extreme southern Florida. It is the national tree of St. Lucia. It is a dicotyledonous plant with simple leaves, which are alternate or in fascicles (clusters) on short shoots. It is naturalized in India. The tree shares its common name with that of the vine calabash, or bottle gourd (''Lagenaria siceraria''). In Cuba, this tree is known to grow in both disturbed habitat and areas of poor drainage. It can grow up to 10 meters tall. Uses Caribbean A calabash is primarily used to make utensils such as cups, bowls, and basins in rural areas. It can be used for carrying water, or for transporting fish, when fishing. In some Caribbean countries, it is worked, painted, and decorated and turned into items by artisans, and sold to tourists. As a cup, bowl, or even a water-pipe or "bong", the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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