Andrew Tracey
Encyclopedia
is a South African ethnomusicologist
Ethnomusicology
Ethnomusicology is defined as "the study of social and cultural aspects of music and dance in local and global contexts."Coined by the musician Jaap Kunst from the Greek words ἔθνος ethnos and μουσική mousike , it is often considered the anthropology or ethnography of music...
, promoter of
African music,
composer, folk singer, band leader, and actor. His father,
Hugh Tracey
Hugh Tracey
Hugh Tracey was an important twentieth century ethnomusicologist. He and his wife collected and archived music from Southern and Central Africa. He began making field recordings of music in the early 20's, through the 70's....
(1903–1977), pioneered the study of traditional
African music in the 1920s - 1970s, created the
International Library of African Music (ILAM)
International Library of African Music
The International Library of African Music is an organization dedicated to the preservation and study of African music. It is seated in Grahamstown, South Africa and is closely affiliated with Rhodes University....
in 1954, and started the company African Musical Instruments (AMI) which manufactured the first
commercial kalimbas in the 1950s. Andrew Tracey
continued and complemented the work of his father Hugh Tracey in a variety of
ways. With brother Paul Tracey, he co-wrote and performed in the world
musical revue Wait a Minim which
traveled around the world for seven years. With his father and brother Paul, Andrew wrote the first instructional materials for the Hugh Tracey kalimbas which were being sent around the world in the 1960s. Upon his father's death in 1977, Andrew took over his father's role as director of ILAM, which he filled until his retirement in 2005, and his wife Heather Tracey took over the role of director of AMI until 1999.
Andrew's Upbringing
Andrew was exposed to African music from an early age ashe observed his father's research on Chopi xylophone music at the family home
in Durban, attended the traditional African dance performances his father arranged
on Sunday afternoons for the dock workers, and listened to his father's
radio broadcasts which featured traditional African stories and African
music. As Hugh Tracey became more devoted to his work on African music,
his marriage frayed, and his wife Ursula Campbell Tracey (1910–1987)
moved to England with sons Paul and Andrew.
Andrew went to Oxford University where he studied anthropology,
languages, and informally, folk music. Andrew was especially intrigued by calypso
and Brazilian music - rhythmic world music with strong African roots.
Return to Africa
Andrew Tracey returned to Africa, first in the British military, butthen later came to South Africa to join brother Paul and his father at
"The Farm", the property in Krugersdorp outside of Johanesburg where Hugh
Tracey started ILAM and AMI. While Paul Tracey oversaw the production
of kalimbas at AMI, Andrew began working with his father, seeking to
understand and document the musics of south eastern Africa.
that Hugh Tracey had fallen in love with in when he arrived in Africa in the 1920s
was the mbira
Mbira
In African music, the mbira is a musical instrument that consists of a wooden board to which staggered metal keys have been attached. It is often fitted into a resonator...
, a complex 24-note thumb piano used by the Shona people of
Zimbabwe. It was a natural homage to this and other related instruments when Hugh
and Andrew Tracey helped Robert Sibson found the Kwanongoma College of African Music
(now United College of Music), in Bulawayo, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in 1960.
Part of Andrew's job in building Kwanongoma was to scout around in the townships
for players of traditional instruments who could come and teach at the new
college. Andrew's big find was Jege Tapera, who played the mbira nyunga nyunga,
also known as the karimba. This was the first experience Andrew had
learning from a traditional player of African music.
Without any formal training in ethnomusicology, Andrew wrote several
papers on African music for the Journal of African Music, the publication his
father started as a means of disseminating the results of research at
ILAM and other institutions about Africa and the world. One of Andrew's
early papers was a description of the mbira music of Jege Tapera.
Wait a Minim
Starting in 1961, Andrew co-wrote, with Jeremy Taylor and his brotherPaul Tracey, the songs for two musical reviews that played in Johanesberg
and in Rhodesia. After combining the
best material into a single musical review, Wait a Minim, they
had a hit on their hands, and they performed in Wait a Minim
between 1962 and 1968 in South Africa, Rhodesia, England, USA,
Canada, New Zealand and Australia, including 461 shows spanning
more than a year on Broadway in New York. With over 50 instruments
in the show, many of them African, Andrew Tracey helped educate
the world about unique African instruments, including the kalimba.
Andrew was on The Tonight Show with Johney Carson a number of times.
This musical performance career put Andrew's ethnomusicology research on hold.
Ethnomusicology
his research on African music, carrying on as an associate at ILAM
under his father. His field research centered on Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Malawi,
Zambia, Uganda, South Africa, and Namibia, focused on the playing technique
of members of the mbira and xylophone families. A highlight of Andrew's
research was the identification of the lower course of
tines on the karimba (i.e., Jege Tapera's mbira nyunga nyunga)
as the logical ancestor of essentially all mbiras. Those eight
notes can be traced through every mbira and karimba played in
the Zambezi Valley, and those eight notes form the core of all kalimba
music in that region, which is considered to be the birthplace of the
metal-tined kalimba about 1300 years ago. Andrew Tracey asserts that the
first written account of the kalimba by Portuguese missionary Father Dos Santos,
in Mozambique in 1589, was in essence these eight notes. Other instruments, such as
the mbira, or the modern karimba (mbira nyunga nyunga), are based on those
eight notes, with other notes and other courses of notes having been
added over the centuries. While it is impossible to say when those eight notes
first started appearing in kalimbas, Andrew's work convinces
that the note layout of the karimba is truly ancient and gave rise to
all other kalimbas in the region.
for a 17-note karimba, based on Tapera's 15-note instrument, using the
same hardware as the Hugh Tracey treble kalimba, and AMI began selling
it as the African Tuned Karimba.
While Andrew's seven year stint performing in a Broadway musical did not leave
any time for ethnomusicological research, Andrew's studies at ILAM
did allow him to perform. In 1969 when he returned to Africa, he started
the Andrew Tracey Steel Pan Band, which performed around Grahamstown
and South Africa and in festivals such as the National Arts Festival
in Grahamstown until 2007.
Andrew as Director of ILAM
When father Hugh Tracey died in 1977, Andrew Tracey took over his job andbecame Director of ILAM and editor of the Journal of African Music, roles
he filed until his retirement in 2005. Andrew's wife Heather took over
African Musical Instruments (AMI), the maker of the Hugh Tracey Kalimbas.
In 1977, apartheid South Africa was seen internationally as a pariah state,
and funding for ILAM dried up. Andrew was able to arrange support for
ILAM from Rhodes University in Grahamstown, South Africa,
which resulted in both ILAM and AMI moving from Krugersdorp to Grahamstown.
African music at Universities in South Africa, Zimbabwe, USA, Germany,
Portugal, for various schools and societies, TV & radio.
He received his own honorary
doctorate in ethnomusicology from the University of Natal in Durban in
1995. David Dargie, a Catholic priest, trained in ethnomusicology under
Andrew and obtained a doctorate from Rhodes University in 1986.
David used this training to help the Xhosa people of South Africa
take pride in their own traditional music, and he pushed to include
traditional African music in Catholic mass.
Andrew Tracey retired from ILAM in 2005, but still lives in Grahamstown,
South Africa, where he is a well-respected and active member of the
community.
Karimba Music
Selected publications
- The 1973 Mgodo wa Mbanguzi and Mgodo wa Mkandeni, two complete performances of traditional music for 'timbila' xylophone orchestra and dance in two Chopi villages in southern Mozambique. Produced by Gei Zantzinger and Andrew Tracey.
- Tracey, Andrew. (1970). How to play the mbiraMbiraIn African music, the mbira is a musical instrument that consists of a wooden board to which staggered metal keys have been attached. It is often fitted into a resonator...
(dza vadzimu). Roodepoort, Transvaal, South Africa: International Library of African Music.
See also
- Hugh TraceyHugh TraceyHugh Tracey was an important twentieth century ethnomusicologist. He and his wife collected and archived music from Southern and Central Africa. He began making field recordings of music in the early 20's, through the 70's....
- Kalimba
- Music of AfricaMusic of AfricaAfrica is a vast continent and its regions and nations have distinct musical traditions. The music of North Africa for the most part has a different history from sub-Saharan African music traditions....
- Music of ZimbabweMusic of ZimbabweZimbabwean music includes folk and pop styles, much of it based on the well-known instrument the mbira which is also popular in many other African countries. An annual Zimbabwe Music Festival is held each year in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. People from all over the world attend...
- Music of MozambiqueMusic of MozambiqueThe native folk music of Mozambique has been highly influenced by Portuguese forms. The most popular style of modern dance music is marrabenta. Mozambican music also influenced another Lusophone music in Brazil, like maxixe , and Cuban music like Mozambique.Culture was an integral part of the...
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