Country of origin: Morocco
Description: Gnawa is a term used to define both a Moroccan musical style and a Muslim religious brotherhood that invokes God and many prophets. The patron saint of the Gnawa is Bilal al Habashi, an Ethiopian who was the first African to convert to Islam and Prophet Mohammed's first muezzin (caller to prayer). The Gnawa also recognize and respect all Muslim saints.
The foundation of Gnawa music originally comes from West Africa, south of the Sahara. In 1591, the Sultan of Morocco, Ahmad el-Mansur, conquered the Songhai Empire, which incorporated lands in the Niger River area, including current day Mali and Niger. As part of the conquest, Morocco captured the Malian city of Timbuktu, the intellectual Center of medieval Black Africa.
Several thousand Bambara-speaking black men and women were sent as servants across the Sahara from West Africa to the Magreb (Northwest Africa). In addition to slavery, some black men were conscripted as mercenaries and others headed north in caravans with the Trans-Saharan trade which connected Sub-Saharan Africa to modern day Morocco, Algeria and Mauritania.
When the West Africans arrived to the north, they brought their music with them which became known as Gnawa. The name Gnawa could indicate that the descendants of black slaves could have come from the old Ghana Empire. The medieval Ghana Empire was located not in Ghana, but in what is now southeastern Mauritania and part of Mali. Some researchers point to the fact that some Gnawa claim their ancestors came from Sudan. Contrary to what may same obvious, “Sudan” does not mean the current nation of Sudan, which much farther to the west, but instead “bled s-sudan,” which literally means the land of the Blacks.
Because the different groups of black Africans played the same type of music, they call themselves the Gnawa people. Gnawa song texts contain many references to the privations of exile and slavery. Gnawa music is based on pentatonic melodies and the syncopated rhythms led by the propulsive drive of a bass lute called sentir (also known as guimbri and hejhuj), metal castanets known as karkabas (also known as k'rkbs, krakebs. and qaraqeb), hand clapping, and chanting.
The Gnawa are most noticeable as entertainers. Each afternoon on Jamaa el-Fna, the large entertainment town square in Marrakech, groups of Gnawa men stage acrobatic dances to the accompaniment of large side drums (tbel or ganga) and the karkabas. The men whirl the long tassels on their caps to the sound of the drums to rouse any spirits (jinn) that may have settled in the area.
Gnawa music is very powerful spiritual music and it is primarily used for healing. The Gnawa carry out trance ceremonies (derdeba) in order to heal people who are very sick. The healing rituals? goal may be to flush out an evil spirit that has brought illness, infertility, anxiety, scorpion stings and psychic disorders, or some other affliction.
The Gnawa cure diseases by the use of colors, fragrances and fear. A central figure in Gnawa lore is a feminine being, a spirit known as Aisha Kandisha. She is a beautiful enchantress and insatiable jinniya (she-devil) with the power to bewitch both women and men. Helpless against her evil charms, her victims are driven beyond the brink of madness to a state of frenzied derangement and even to suicide. The only way to lift the curse is through elaborate trance ceremonies such as the ones carried out by the Gnawa. On the other hand, the purpose of the derbeba may be to extend a helpful relationship with a spirit that has brought prosperity, good fortune, or some other baraka (blessings).
The derdeba lasts all night long in order to carry out the healing and purification process. The musicians and devotees warm up for the derdeba with entertainment music played on the sentir. When they are ready to initiate the ceremony, all the participants congregate outside, in front of the house where the derdeba is to take place. The drums and karkabas proclaim to neighbors and spirits alike that the derdeba is about to begin. The crowd then walks back inside the house in a candlelight procession. The m'allem (lead musician or maestro) again plays the sentir, and the group sings and plays a series of songs to offer the robes to be worn during the ceremony, while the other partakers share dates and milk.
The whole ceremony includes seven parts, each controlled by a different saint or family of spirits. Each section is associated with clothing of a particular color. The ritual sends some of the participants into a trance or a spirit may first possess a devotee, and then express through the dancer's mouth its desire for the appropriate tune. The trance state is accelerated by the proper combination of spices and incense that must be burned, and the dancer must be dressed in the spirit's preferred color.
A complete derdeba may last all night, well past dawn on the following day. As the trance ceremony ends, the musicians return to lighter music meant to relax the spectators.
The Gnawa lute goes by a variety of names, including sentir (a term related to the Persian word santur), hejhuj (an onomatopoeic Arabic word) and gog (probably derived from a West African word for fiddle).
The most common name for the instrument, guimbri (also of West African derivation), is not often used by the Gnawa themselves. The body of the instrument is hollowed out from a single piece of wood, and covered with camel skin. The long neck passes through the top of the body and runs under the face, coming out through the skin near the base of the instrument, to serve as a tailpiece or string-carrier.
The sliding leather tuning rings and the rattle-like metal sound modifier are commonly found in such West African instruments as the kora and the halam (lute). The percussive playing style is reminiscent not only of West African technique but also of certain styles of American banjo picking.
Other World Music Genres
