In southwestern parts of the Central African Republic there is three-part harmonic singing with vocal parts shifting chromatically between two roots one semitone apart. In northern central Africa it is found among the Zande and related peoples. It is also found throughout western central Africa, among most peoples of Angola, Zambia, and Malawi, and in many parts of East Africa. Homophonic multipart singing is found in particular concentration along the Guinea Coast. In other cultures movement is strictly parallel within the structure of the tone system concerned.
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For example, in eastern Angola contrary motion is normal practice. To what extent the latter is permitted depends upon the tolerance within the tonality of the particular language. In practice, though, not only parallel but also oblique and contrary motion may occur. Their voices may stand a third, a fourth, a fifth, or an octave apart, but they are considered to sing the same tune. Men sing “with a big voice” (i.e., in low voices), women and children “with small voices” (i.e., high voices). Individual singers conceive of their voice lines-all carrying the same text-as identical in principle, only sung at different levels. In homophonic styles all melodic lines, though at different pitch levels, are rhythmically the same, and they begin and end together. Multipart singing in African music embraces two entirely different approaches, homophonic and polyphonic, with the definition of these words adapted to African cultures. Questions raised in the 19th and early 20th centuries as to whether the hunting bow or the musical bow was invented first are certainly irrelevant in the culture of southern African prehistoric hunters. Among the San, the discovery of the use of the hunting bow as a musical instrument, and with it the discovery of the harmonics of a stretched string, constituted a cluster of traits that were probably interdependent. Polyphonic singing styles were almost certainly used by prehistoric hunters in central and southern Africa. Contrary to earlier opinions, “harmony” in African music is now seen to be not a result of acculturation but rather indigenous to many parts of the continent. Multipart singing and harmonic concepts are basic traits of many African musical traditions and have been observed by Western travelers since the earliest periods of contact.
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