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Bowscapes review: album celebrates new traditions in South Africa’s ancient bow music

Bowscapes review: album celebrates new traditions in South Africa’s ancient bow music

MUSICAL bows are among the oldest instruments in southern Africa. Musicologists think the “ping” a bowstring makes when an arrow is released inspired early hunters (as far back as the Khoi and San nations) to use it for music-making in ritual and, later, other contexts. Author GWEN ANSELL, Associate of the Gordon Institute for Business Science, University of Pretoria The passing, in 2022, of South Africa’s bow virtuoso Latozi “Madosini” Mpahleni reminded South Africans of traditional bow music’s significance in the region’s intangible cultural heritage. When you pluck, strike or stroke the string of a musical bow, you get not…
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