Cradled in the heart of the African Rain forest lives one of the oldest and most sensitive musical cultures on Earth. The music of the Baka pygmies is a secret, it is something very special. It has profoundly influenced all who have come into contact with it: you can hear it in the music of the Baka's neighbours in West Africa, and by a process of diffusion you can find its influence in the Blues and western popular music too.
When walking along forest paths, dwarfed beneath towering buttress rooted trees, it is rare to see far ahead due to the luxuriant thickness of the undergrowth. Hearing rather than seeing thus becomes your most important sense. The Baka find their way by 'listening to the forest'. By recognising the sounds made by different streams or rivers, by distant camps, or even individual trees, and by talking to each other across surprisingly long distances, they are able to know exactly where they are even away from the path. This need to 'navigate with sound' coupled with the absence of the background noise of cars, radios and machines that people of industrialised countries have to contend with, has meant that the Baka have developed an incredibly keen sense of hearing.
When listening, you too need a special kind of awareness that goes beyond hearing just the sound of the music itself, to imagining and feeling the forest that surrounds and supports it: birds and insects singing, rivers flowing, trees swaying, people talking and laughing are all part of any performance. Also imagine the human situations that gave rise to the music in the first place, for the Baka are an egalitarian people who can use different music to solve disputes, regulate day-to-day affairs, heal illness and create the power and energy needed for communication with their spirit world.
The music you can hear can be thought of as living in three different but not entirely separate spheres. On the one hand there is music for pleasure and leisure, such as the water drumming (tracks 4, 5 & 13), which occurs while women and children are washing at the river in the morning. Children also play cooperative games which include songs such as track six. The stringed instruments such as the aita (track 8), limbindi (tracks 10 & 12), or ngombi ( tracks 7, 9, 16, 17 & 19), may be played by all at any time of the day or night providing a musical background to everyday events.
There is also music that provides moral and spititual education and guidance for daily life. At the same time as they explain how things came to be, this music also contains specific advice from 'Komba' (the Baka's Creator) on sharing, mariage arrangements, hunting techniques and the lifestyle of the animal inhabitants of the forest.
Finally there is music used in specific ritual contexts such as Yelli (tracks 1, 2 & 3) and Abale (track 14) in which the Baka communally 'talk' with their guardian spirits, assert their sense of community and restore the benificient protection of the Forest. The Baka say that it is these spirits, each inhabiting a particular region of the forest, who are the real composers of this style of music. Their music is then transmitted to particular human owners, often a husband and wife, who then lead the particular performances. They then also have the right to initiate others into the correct performance of a dance which may involve individual Baka in many months of arduous preparation, rites of purification, and the study of of forest lore. Baka may travel hundreds of miles for such initiation, and make friends and contacts that help different groups maintain ties.
The yodelling that characterises much sacred music is considered a sort of non-linguistic code for communicating with the unseen world of spirits and departed relatives. There are no words: the message is passed and the spirits' benediction invoked in soundscapes beyond the reach of language.
Baka music needs sensitive listening. It has affected all people who have come into contact with it and altered their way of hearing and performing. We hope that you too will listen with fresh ears tothesewonderful sounds and receive with joy some of their secrets.
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