Performance of Malagasy music

Music has long helped a variety of secular and sacred purposes in Madagascar. Song may come in term of daily tasks, provide entertainment, preserve history or communicate social and political messages. Music is similarly essential to the experience of spiritual ritual among many other ethnic and religious groups on the island.

source of picture: en.wikipedia.org

Among some of the ethnic groups music, which helps advances the repetitive or arduous task is Geo Shaw who is a missionary to Madagascar in the 19^th century, explain observing Betsileo and Merina serfs singing in the rice fields, timing the music to the trends of their bodies so at the point of each accented note they plant a stalk. Also, songs may follow the paddling of dugout canoes on long journeys. Music may also follow another type of entertainment such as songs chanted by female audiences at matches of moraingy that is a traditional form of full-body wrestling that is popular in coastal areas.

The protection of oral record may be achieved through musical performance in Madagascar among the Betsileo. For example, oral histories are retold through a type of musical performance known as rija which has its current form that represent a mixture of the original single verse rija which is an epic poem known as isa. The Betsileo rija is performed by two men and each of them play a jejy while singing very loud with a strained pitch in the soprano range.

The structure of the song is difficult unlike other Malagasy musical patterns, and the parallel thirds are nor main in the harmony. Other southern ethnic groups also performed simplified changes on rija featuring for instance a solo artist who strums rather than fiddles his accompanying instrument and songs at a lower and natural pitch. While Betsileo rija can address different themes for those who performed by other southern groups and it is always a praise songs that recall a favovrably memorable occasion.

Without the external cause of the musical patterns it serves as a type of artistic expression, as in the highly modify ba-gasy genre of Imerina. The ba- gasy appeared in combination with the French introduction of the operetta and the following came up at Malagasy theatre at the Theatre Municipale d’lsotry starting from late 1910s. The type of vocal pattern used in the ba-gasy is described by the female using Angola, which is a vocal ornamentation gotten through the nasal tone, offset by the fasiny (which is the tenor) and increase moving beno (baritone) line sung by men. Ba-gasy motivate the musical duet pattern of Kaolon’ny Fahiny which is fame in Imerina during the last two years of the colonial era, where by the bas-gasy vocal emotional response are applied to love themes and it is followed by the modified composition for piano or occasionally guitar.

The musical performance in the Highlands took a clearly and educative role through the hira gasy (hira: a song; gasy: Malagasy). The hira gasy which is a day-long sight of music, dance and a stylized type of traditional oratory called kabary which is performed by a troupe or as contest between two or more troupes and the roots of hira gasy are unsure. Oral record traits its new form in 18^th century Merina king Andrianampoinimerina who reportedly engaged artists to gather the public together for royal speeches and announcements (kabary) and to appreciate them for the labour of public works project in term of building dikes to irrigate the rice paddies that surround the Antananarivo. Over the period, this artists formed independent troupes that uses the non-threatening performance method to explore aware social and political themes in the public places.

The troupes of hira gasy now are the odd and ends of the tradition of court artists that continued through the end of the 19^th century. During the queen Ranavalona III, the last monarch in the Merina reign, it has three official groups of state artists: one for the queen, one for the prime minister and one for the city of Antanarivo. The troupe of the queen is made up over 300 artists. Until slavery was stopped, artists in these groups were also the members of the slave class (andevo) and it is directed by Hova (free Merina). In each Christmas year, the directors of each of the group will arrange a show before the queen of a new original composition; the queen will take the winner among the three groups. While the artists of the court (and therefore the earliest hira gasy troupes) initially performed by using the traditional instruments such as sodina, jejy voatavo and drums during the cause of the 19^th century, the increasing European effect led the court artists and hira gasy troupes similar to make the increase use of the foreign instruments like clarinets, trombones, violins, and trumpets. The court musician’s custom died out with the elimination of the monarchy in Madagascar after the French colonization, but the hira gasy custom has continued to flourish.

Musical pattern from the abroad being joined with the pre-existing Malagasy musical customs to make clearly Malagasy sound with foreign origin. Afrindrafibdrao is an instance, a tune which is based on the French quadrille that was fame in Malagasy court in 19^th century. A precise type of partner dance follows this piece, where the dancers will make a long chain of male-female pairs with the woman at the front of each pair which both facing forward, holding each other hands moving to the rhythm of the music. from its roots as a courtly dance, the afindrafindrao now is typically Malagasy custom performed at every beginning of a social activities or show to start the festivities.

Music is a popular element of spiritual ritual and ceremonies all over the island. For example, the members of the hira gasy troupes are traditionally call to perform at the famadihana reburial ceremonies of central Madagascar. The seaside area, music is vital to help the medium to enter a dream state during the tromba ritual. While in a dream, the medium is controlled by an ancestral spirit. Each of the spirit is trusted to prefer a particular tune or pattern of music and it will not enter the medium unless the particular piece of music is performed at the ceremony.

London Missionary Society (LMS) of the British came to Antananarivo in 1820 during the administration of King Radama I. Following the spread of Christianity in Madagascar was coupled with the beginning of solfege as missionaries established in Malagasy-language hymns for their nascent church. The first trend of the missionaries was grateful to depart Madagascar under the Ranavalona I in 1836 but the hymns they made became the early anthems for Malagasy converts persecuted under Queen’s traditionalist rules. In 1871, the missionary of LMS like J, Richardson amended the rhythms and harmony of these initially hymns, which were considerably affected by the European musical patterns such as quadrilles and waltzes. Initially, the church music was performed by slaves seated in groups of four to five at the church front. At 1870s more European congregational pattern had been accepted by all the members of the church rising on their feet to sing together.