Indigenous People

Fair Trade Fusion

Summary

All too often, world-dance fusion projects are characterised by a marked imbalance between the western studio / label on the one hand and the world musicians on the other.  Often, the world musicians are excluded from much of the creative process, particularly the post-production - their music and culture arranged by western producers with little knowledge of traditional arrangements or the sensitivities and sensibilities the traditions demand. As a result, the end-product is invariably over-westernised, losing much of the beauty and appeal of the music in its traditional form and relegating the traditional component to the status of a mere adornment on top of a western dance beat. This reflects the underlying nature of the relationship between the west and communities of the South - the imbalance of cultural and economic power achieving expression through the music.

The Fair Trade Fusion project seeks to readdress this imbalance by empowering the participating musicians at every stage of the production, adopting production values and processes that are designed to harness the broader appeal of working with western dance music without losing much of the meaning and beauty of the traditional element. The participating live producer will adopt a supportive rather than domineering creative role, enabling the knowledge and wisdom of the traditional musicians to achieve fullest expression.

The project represents the first of a unique series of collaborations between indigenous African music and dance producers. It will see Kakatsitsi, Master Drummers from Ghana fusing the organic, human sounds of traditional West African dance music with the pulsating energy of western dance music provided by Nico Bentley and Steve Peake on laptop, building a cultural bridge between the dance cultures of Africa and the West.

The project comprises two main threads of activity: Firstly a live music tour and secondly the production of a CD for commercial release however this will only begin when the live component of the project is up and running. Through these activities, the Fair Trade Fusion project will explore the role of dance cultures in bringing people together to celebrate a sense of ‘tribe’ or community, featuring an interactive dimension that will enable the audience to actively participate in the music and dance. There is potential for a series of workshops held in the community prior to a live music night which will devise a dance to accompany the fusion set as well as fulfilling a valuable community outreach and marketing role. The powerful social message of the fusion set will be enhanced by a number of video installations, complemented by information and crafts stalls and visual art displays from indigenous artists and craftspeople. Additionally the decoration of the club will be designed according to the fusion of indigenous tradition and modern western styles.

Aims and Objectives

·         Use new technologies to empower traditional cultural practitioners to communicate their own cultural reality through media over which they have a greater degree of control.

·         Preserve and develop the live component of traditional music whilst enabling it to cross over into an environment where digitally recorded music is currently dominant.

·         Facilitate a creative dialogue between traditional and modern dance cultures that fosters a renewed sense of creativity in both indigenous and western dance cultures.

·         Broaden access to and promote a greater understanding of art and culture in traditional societies in general and of African drumming and dance in particular.

·         Explore different ways in which the building blocks of traditional rhythms, melodies and movements can be used to develop adaptations of traditional forms to fit a variety of modern contexts.

·         Introduce a greater degree of participation into club culture and reduce the reliance of club goers on drugs as a precondition for artistic or creative expression, thereby fostering a rediscovery of cultural tradition and community in life.

·         Raise awareness of the challenges and obstacles facing practitioners of traditional culture in Africa, breaking down stereotypes and promoting cultural understanding and tolerance.

·         Explore notions of progress and development and the extent to which ‘western’ cultural values, and the developmental models they foster, can be complemented by those of the non-west.

The Fusion Set

An important part of the Fair Trade Fusion tour is to restore a human, organic quality to the performance of dance music that is perhaps lost by the DJ or producer standing alone behind a console of synthesizers or laptops, twiddling knobs on pre-arranged digital tracks which are played over the sound-system. In many ways this is a sterilization of dance music as the essence of traditional dance musical forms stem from its live performance, demonstrating the flexibility of the medium to communicate collective feeling and emotion.

The project is therefore keen to avoid compromising the essentially traditional sound and feeling of live traditional world music without which its music loses much of its energy and spirit. Experience of previous fusion projects, in which the traditional sounds was recorded, cut up, tweaked and played back through samplers and sequencers, was one that was dis-empowering for the traditional musicians and one that failed to tap their wealth of knowledge and experience of traditional African musical arrangements. The dynamics of the cultural relationship and dialogue between the West and the non-West, between the traditional and the modern and between the technological and the human will therefore provide the underlying metaphor of the proposed project, with an emphasis on empowering the traditional musicians by involving them in every part of the creative process and thereby allowing their unique musical knowledge and energy to achieve its fullest expression, whilst using a foundation of western beats, synthesizers and musical devices to enable them to engage with new audiences.

For some tracks, the music will be led by the traditional realm, with the drummers laying down a traditional pattern, into which the western producer will add the digital beats and melodic loops. Alternatively, the producer will lay down a minimalist track on top of which the traditional musicians could layer their traditional rhythms and chants. Exploring different ways of making the music and remaining conscious of the extent to which the process by which music is made has an impact on the end product will be an integral part of the project.

The sounds created by the indigenous musicians, whether on drums, acoustic instruments of the voices will at times be put through the effects and filters at the disposal of the producer. Additionally, electronic percussion and triggers will be used to give the indigenous musicians an even greater array of sounds they can produce.

Structures such as call and response offer an opportunity for dialogue not only between different instruments, both digital and organic, but also between different structures and rhythmic traditions. The element of participation inherent in traditional cultural celebration will also be re-introduced by providing opportunities for people on the dance floor to enter into call and response interplays with the chants of the traditional musicians.

Decor

The decoration of the venue will done using traditional textiles, sourced from Ghana and Mali in addition to a visual art works from Ghanaian visual artist Jerry Blankson and Ghanaian sculptor / carver Eric Darku. 

Video Installations

To enable people to gain an insight in to the social and cultural background behind the music, a multimedia presentation will be shown in the club using video projectors, using still and moving images documenting the social context of the traditional music and dance in the home communities of the musicians and dancers in Ghana and Namibia.

The Dance Dimension

In addition to the musical dimension, dance offers a means to involve the ‘audience’ in the artistic experience. Members of the audience will be involved in the dance performance through a series of workshops to be held in local art/music colleges during the day and in youth/community centres during the evening.

The dance will be comprised of a body of structured, directed work using traditional African movements and led by dancers of the two traditions, interspersed with a period of free expression in which the participants will adapt the structures and movements featured in the traditional component to suit themselves, their feelings and their cultural backgrounds. The result will be a fusion of styles, structures and moves reflecting the underlying dialogue between the three dance cultures. The over-riding aim is therefore to add to the pool of building materials which people dancing in a club environment can access to improvise and adapt their own structures, styles and steps to suit and express their own creativity.