African Drumming - Key words

Question 1

A Capella

Answer 1

Singing without musical accompaniment

Question 2

Accelerando

Answer 2

Gradual increase in speed

Question 3

Accent

Answer 3

The emphasis or stress placed on a particular note

Question 3

Balafon

Answer 3

A gourd-resonated xylophone

Question 4

Call and response

Answer 4

A compositional technique, often a succession of two distinct phrases that works like a conversation in music

Question 5

Cross rhythms

Answer 5

Two conflicting rhythms heard together

Question 6

Cyclic rhythms

Answer 6

any compositional form characterized by the repetition, in a later movement or part of the piece, of motives, themes, or whole sections from an earlier movement in order to unify structure.

Question 7

Decelerando

Answer 7

Gradual decrease in speed

Question 8

Djembe drum

Answer 8

A rope-tuned skin-covered goblet drum played with bare hands, originally from West Africa.

Question 9

Dundun

Answer 9

A family of cylindrical African drums.

Question 10

Dynamics

Answer 10

The variation of loudness in music, how loud or soft.

Question 11

Falsetto

Answer 11

A male voice which is artificially high

Question 12

Gourd

Answer 12

A record label featuring acoustic instrumental music with various ensembles of guitar, cello, flute, oboe, harp, fiddle, hammered and mountain dulcimer, banjo and mandolin.

Question 13

African flute

Question 14

Improvisation

Answer 14

The activity of making or doing something not planned beforehand, often to make a particular performer stand out.

Question 15

Kora

Answer 15

An instrument that combines features of the harp and lute

Question 16

Maracas

Answer 16

A hand percussion instrument usually played in pairs and common in Caribbean, Latin American, and South American music

Question 17

Master drummer

Answer 17

The person who leads other drummers in playing drum rhythms

Question 18

Mbira

Answer 18

Uniquely African percussion instrument

Question 19

Oral tradition

Answer 19

The process masters of the music used to efficiently pass musical wisdom down to succeeding generations of musicians

Question 20

Ostinato

Answer 20

A repeated pattern

Question 21

Polyrhythm

Answer 21

A combination of two or more rhythms played simultaneously while moving at the same linear tempo

Question 22

Polyphonic

Answer 22

They can play multiple independent melody lines simultaneously

Question 23

Repetition

Answer 23

The repeating of certain parts of a song

Question 24

Syncopation

Answer 24

An off-beat rhythm

Question 25

Talking drum

Answer 25

An hourglass-shaped pressure drum so-named because it can imitate spoken language’s intonations and rhythms

Question 26

Tempo

Answer 26

The rate of speed

Question 27

Unison

Answer 27

Occurs when two or more people play or sing the same pitch or in octaves

Question 28

Vocal register

Answer 28

A series of consecutive tones with similar properties