Catholic and Islamic
On my second day in Stone Town, Zanzibar, my kind host showed me the way through the nooks and crannies of the old metropolis, with its winding alleyways. I noticed a Cathedral and was taken aback, especially since Zanzibar has a majority Islamic population. My host explained to me that the early explorers from either Portugal or Spain must have been responsible for the building of a Catholic Church in the heart of this neighbourhood.
I didn’t find a moment to venture inside the Church during my stay on the island, but I was intrigued when I noticed that almost all of the singing participants in the music theatre project which I was working on at the Dhow Countries Music Academy, had Christian names. I had a wonderful chaperone, who explained to me that there was a clear cultural divide between the Christian and Muslim local singers. The Muslim singers were most likely to stick to singing Taarab – the music of Zanzibar and Swahili speakers.
The Music Academy presents regular Taarab concerts and I managed to attend two performances – one in the institution’s recital room and the other in an open public space in Stone Town. I enjoyed listening to the ambience of the music, which reminded me in some ways of the timbres and textures of Tango, which I learnt a lot about when I visited Buenos Aires, over a decade ago.
After our concert and semi staged performance of my piece “King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba”, I was interviewed by a local TV Channel (Faraji TV) and they wanted to know my opinions about Taarab music and what advice I would give to young musicians from the island. I told them that Taarab music is obviously the musical lingua franca of the Zanzibari people, so I think the musicians should be aiming to stretch the boundaries of what can be done with the genre. I could easily imagine opera and music drama based on Taarab musical ideas.
In the same way that Zanzibar has managed to become a hotspot for global tourism, Taarab music has the potential to travel across borders and regions to other parts of the world. Wouldn’t it be interesting if there was a new development within the genre that could accommodate the aesthetics and sensibilities of the non Muslim peoples of Zanzibar as well?
