Unit 36: Studying Music from around the World - Influence on Western music

Examples of World Music in Fusion with Western Music Genres:

1. The Incredible String Band - The Half Remarkable Question

This songs is an example of traditional English folk music being fused with classical Indian music, recorded in 1968. Western bands fusing their musical styles with Indian music was common between 1965-68 in both Britain and the U.S.A., but more often the bands were of rock 'n' roll origin like The Beatles & Stones, but examples like this were also happening with The Incredible String Band, Magic Carpet and Pentangle all fusing folkier sounds with Indian music aiming for a psychedelic result. In this song the traditional Indian instrument brought into accompany the acoustic guitar and vocals is the sitar, upon which the performer duplicates the melody line of the guitar for the introduction. As it typical with indian raga's the chord progression for the most part centre around the one chord (D in this case) and plays notes only in the major scale of this note which means that the sitar can be put to best use with the drone from the sympathetic strings and the chords of the guitarist blending harmonically. The chords, vocal melody and sitar melody of the verses always stay in D major, and in the entire song the only chord changes or different notes used by the vocalist are in the D major scale anyway, and therefore still work harmonically with the drone of the sitar that is always the D.

Apart from these obvious influences, there are compositional similarities between this song and Indian writing too. The vocalist in the chorus uses a melodic phrasing which sounds like a phrase you may hear a sitarist use, because it is modal, which means it uses the notes shape on the C major scale (all white notes on a piano) played D to D, removing the two sharps of the usual D major scale. This means that each note is a tone apart, and when he holds the note at the end of the line "It's the old forgotten question" around 55 seconds into the song, that instead holding the one note he uses the two notes a tone either side (C and E) and these three notes together sound typically eastern because of their modal relationship. This technique is used again with the vocals in a bridge around 2.50 into the song with the notes G, A, B, C again modally to sound eastern, where in a usually D major scale you would use C sharp not a C.

Also the lyrics of this song explore spiritual themes which are so closely tied to the Sitar itself, as the teaching of the instrument is passed down generationally along with spiritual and religious teachings of the Buddhist religion. Lyrics such as "what is it that we are part of"  and "what is it that we are" may reference directly or indirectly religious passages they had read in relation to Buddhism from Guru's or Maharishi's that may have informed their views, or inspired what the song was written about, but this is speculative. These lyrics meet more old fashioned english ones too, synonymous with traditional folk, in lines like "O Long, O Long e're yet my eyes" that sound like writing from older English Literature.

This song doesn't contain any percussion, so only harnesses the melodic indian influence with sitar, but doesn't use tabla's, tambura's or dilruba's like The Beatles song "Within You, Without You" by George Harrison which contains all these, combined with chamber orchestration of western origin. However this song is very closely linked to and inspired by traditional Indian Music, like so much western music from this time period was.

Incredible String Band - Half Remarkable Question

2. Bonobo - Cirrus

On this song, Bonobo combines music of minimal electronic/downtempo style with tuned percussive instruments of eastern origin, creating a fusion of eastern and western music. This track doesn't rely on soft synths or typical electronic textures and sounds for it's key compositional components, but it still maintains a groove and rhythm which you expect to hear from electronic or downtempo music. This kind of electronic music is generally more subtle and chilled than 120BPM Dance music or House music, so lends itself more to softer tones like the ones used to create this track than that sort of electronic music would.

The song build up linearly like a lot of electronic music does, building toward a climactic point towards the end of the piece. This means different instruments are added one by one, playing different rhythms which create poly-rhythms with what's already in the track, and when pads or smooth textures are added, this thickens up the song in both it's layers, frequency content and dynamics. The instruments in this track are chimes and metalophones and which you may find in Gamelan orchestra's in countries like Indonesia. They sound similar to vibraphones which are used in western orchestra's and American Jazz ensembles. These instruments are subtle, and their tones are soft compared to synthesisers used in harder dance music.

There are similarities to Gamelan in this Bonobo track, and some differences also. First of all, a difference is this track contains no breaks in rhythm for call and response techniques, or rests like Gamelan does, but that's because the foundation to this track is the constant four four kid drum and this style of music isn't intended to stop like Gamelan is, just to build up in the linear sense. However there are rhythmical similarities in the layering of percussion. 30 seconds into the track you can hear over the space of 16 bars that there's a kick drum on every beat, a snare drum on every other beat, two hats per beat, and then sprinkled across the 16 bars at irregular intervals are the chimes of metallic instruments like hand cymbals, tibetan bowls and met allophone hits, which when layered with these other things create complex and varying poly-rythms which develop throughout the track to keep the listener interested. A bassline is also introduced, which is more from the electronic background, but again shares similarities with Gamelan as they use large Gongs to create bass tones, if not necessarily basslines, and large drums for baser rhythms also. There is some call and response in the rhythmic hook of this song though, as one instrument begins with a rhythm looped four times, and then a different instrument responds with another phrase, looping twice but covering the same amount of bars, which is a sort of call and response between these two parts.

Bonobo - Cirrus

3. Joni Mitchell - The Jungle Line

This Joni Mitchell song from 1975 represents a fusion of her Folk/Songwriter background with developing Jazz influences and African drumming which provides the rhythmic backbone of the song and creates the afro fusion. The drumming on this song is played by The Royal Drummers of Burundi who are a percussion ensemble from the Republic nation, which borders Rwanda and The United Republic of Tanzania. They play percussive instruments, native to their country called Karyenda drums, which are made from hollowed tree trunks with animal skins stretched over the top. The instruments were important in their culture for dances and entertainment, and the group would perform at events like weddings and coronations, as well as appearing on recordings like this one. The drums are sampled from a recording they made.

The use of the drummers on this song gives it the steady, pounding rhythm you'd associate with african drumming music, which isn't used in Joni Mitchell's earlier work, showing her compositional growth and interest in other cultures, sourcing her inspiration to continue making music, given she'd been successful for 6 or so years before this track was released. The theme of the song refers broadly to nature, but the jungle references may explain the inclusion and influence of african music. The writing style is jazzy though as well, as the changes of chords and notes, and the scattered sections of woodwind and horns all sound reminiscent of experimental modern jazz and jazz fusion, like Sun Ra and late 1960's Miles Davis records. Lyrics like "The savage progress cuts the jungle line" may refer to natural habitat being destroyed for the sake of development, making this a form of protest song.

Her lyrics reference nature, animals and landscape of africa, but put them in the setting of America, which she is familiar with, and in doing so give her opinions on the themes of development and protest in this song with lines like "And metal skin and ivory birds, Go steaming up to Rousseau's vines, They go steaming up to Brooklyn Bridge". This song is transformed from a standard jazz-rock song to a world music piece with the inclusion of african drums, which add to the overall sound of the composition.

Joni Mitchell - The Jungle Line