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Photo by Joakim Nilsson
Daniel Laemouahuma Jatta is a Jola musician/scholar from Mandinary, Gambia, currently living in Sweden. In the early 1980s, he pioneered the folkloric and organological study and documentation of his people's principal folk instrument, the akonting (spelled ekonting in French transliteration). It's a plucked lute with a drum-like gourd body (either round or teardrop-shaped), a full-spike fretless stick neck, and three strings (two long melody strings and one short drone string akin to the "thumb string" on the 5-sting banjo.
In 2000, Swedish banjo historian Ulf Jägfors introduced Daniel Jatta and his groundbreaking work on the Jola akonting to the international banjo community at the Third Annual Banjo Collectors Gathering, an annual conference of the foremost collectors of antique banjos and scholars of the instrument's history and organology from around the globe. Up until that point, the akonting was relatively unknown outside of the rural Jola villages throughout Senegambia.
For the banjo world, the Jola akonting was quite a revelation. From the 1960s on, the conventional wisdom had been that the West African archtypes of the banjo were the griots lutes-- such as the Mande ngoni, the Wolof xalam, the Fula hoddu, and so on. However, the problem was that the early banjos shared none of the physical characteristics of the standard griot lutes, save for a short thumb string. All the accounts of the earliest banjos specified that these instruments had bulbous gourd bodies. In sharp contrast, the typical griot lutes have narrow wooden bodies. Also it was widely accepted that plucked lutes in West Africa were only played by traditional musical/word artisans like the griots. To the best of common knowledge, no one had ever come across a West African plucked lute that had both a gourd body and a short thumb string-- let alone, one that was a vernacular folk instrument. This being the case, Daniel's presentation of the akonting was tantamount to the unveiling of a newly-discovered "missing link."
Since then, word of the akonting has been spreading like wildfire. This once obscure West African folk instrument is now gaining recoginition the world over as a living ancestor of the banjo.
THE JOLA & THE AKONTING
"Like most people in my village, my parents were rice farmers. My father was a herbalist as well and my mother was also a traditional potter. In the evenings after work he played the akonting to entertain the community. My mother accompanied him on the ku nuk kata oh lahai (clog-shapped wooden clappers)."
--Daniel Jatta
The Jola (also Diola in French transliteration) are an ancient people who live primarily in the southern region of Senegal known as Casamance (centered on the Casamance River and located just below present-day Gambia), Gambia, and northern Guinea-Bissau. Primarily rice farmers, the Jola are thought to have introduced rice cultivation into Senegambia centuries ago. Unfortunately, their skill and knowledge of rice farming made the Jola "prize catches" for slavers during the dark days of the Transatlantic Slave Trade.
(The terror of abduction by slavers is ingrained in the collective consciousness of the Jola. When he first picked up the akonting, Daniel's grandparents admonished him never to play his instrument in the evening outside the village. The fear was that devils, attracted by the music, would kidnap him and he would never would be seen again. While this may seem like a quaint superstition, its actually a practical piece of advice that has been handed down from generation to generation. Back in the days of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, Jola villages along the banks of the Casamance River and Gambia River were in easy striking distance of raiding parties looking for slaves to sell to the Europeans based in forts along the nearby Atlantic coast. To this day, the legacy of that time are horrific memories of neighbors and loved ones disappearing in the night, without a trace, save for the discovery of mysterious footprints in the river bank the following morning.)
Casamance (southern Senegal) is the heartland of the Jola people and culture. According to oral tradition, the birthplace of the akonting is the village of Kanjanka in Lower Casamance, nearby the banks of the Casamance River. The name of the instrument's home village is recalled in the most common tuning pattern for the akonting's three open strings (from the 3rd short "thumb string" to the 1st long melody string): kan (the 5th note of the scale, tuned an octave higher), jan (root note), ka (flatted 7th note). Like in the traditional old-time/folk styles of playing the 5-sting banjo, the akonting is tuned in different tunings. Using the Kanjanka tuning pattern of 5/1/-7, a common tuning in Casamance is dGF. In Gambia, for another variant, the 1st long melody is raised a semitone (half-step) higher to make a natural 7th note, as in cFE.
TRADITIONAL AKONTING MUSIC
"The music of the akonting has been and still is folk music. Akonting players do not play music to confer status on patrons. They play their music, usually in the evenings after work, to relax and have a nice time before going to bed. Also when in their rice field "bars" (hu waa in Jola), the Jola play the akonting in the evening after working in their rice fields and drink their palm wine that they are expert in tapping from the palm tree. Akonting music deals with all matters of life and does not need to be augmented by any other instrument to be danceable. It is rhythmic enough to enable one to dance."
--Daniel Jatta
Traditional Jola village society is non-hierarchical and communal. The Jola do not have the rigid tripartite caste system of the Mandinka, Fula, and Wolof. Unlike these neighboring peoples, the Jola consider lute playing to be a vernacular social activity that anyone can join in, rather than the exclusive province of a griot caste of hereditary professional musicians and praise-singers. In fact, the Jola have no tradition of praise-singing whatsoever. This being the case, the akonting is traditionally played by villagers for personal and communal entertainment in the evening after their day's labors. Akonting music is also heard whenever villagers get together to drink palm wine, dance, and have friendly wrestling matches, a favorite traditional sport.
THE AKONTING/ BANJO CONNECTION
In 1975, Daniel headed to the United States to study and spent the next nine years earning degrees at various universities in the South. There he was introduced to the 5-string banjo. The American instrument fasinated Daniel; it reminded him of the akonting played by his father. Daniel soon learned that the banjo was originally a gourd-bodied instrument created by enslaved Africans. This fact intrigued him-- there had to be a connection between the two instruments!
After earning his MBA in 1981 at Atlanta University-- a leading African American institution of higher learning, founded in 1865-- Daniel began to investigate the apparent parallels between the New World gourd banjo and the akonting. Three years later, he returned to his village in Gambia. There he studied the art of akonting playing under the tutelage of his father-- a traditional player originally from the instrument's birthplace, the Casamance region of Senegal.
In 1985, Daniel began to travel throughout Gambia and Casamance (Senegal) searching out older akonting players to learn the traditional repertoire and to try and piece together the akonting's full story. Likewise, he interviewed tradition-bearers of the bunchundo,
the folk lute of the Manjak (also Manjago), a Senegambian people who share a great deal in common with their Jola neighors, especially when it comes to music. The bunchundo is a case in point-- it's practically identical to the Jola akonting. The principal difference between the two closely related instruments is in the way they're played. The bunchundo is played by either strumming with the thumb or up-picking in a fashion that's reminiscent of 5-string banjo "finger-picking." Conversely, the akonting is down-picked: that is, the fingernail of a single finger-- either the index or the middle finger-- picks out the tune by striking one of the instrument's two long melody strings in a downward motion, immediately followed by the thumb catching on the short top third drone string to create a "back-beat"-driven rhythmic accompaniment.
The Jola down-picking technique-- o'teck in Jola (literally, "to stroke")-- is incredibly similar to the oldest known style of playing the 5-string banjo known as stroke style. This is the technique that the blackface minstrels-- European American circus and stage performers who blackened their face in crude parody of African Americans-- learned from the slave musicians when they first picked up the banjo in the early 19th century. Prior to that the banjo was specifically an African American and African Caribbean folk instrument. The "stroke style" of banjo down-picking survives to this very day in the folk traditions of the rural South, where it is known as frailing, clawhammer, thumping, and so on.
PERPETUATING A PEOPLE'S MUSICAL LEGACY
"The akonting is now very rare in Gambia. When I was a child, many people played it. One could not count the number of people in my village who could play. Today, I know of only one akonting master left in Mandinary-- Sagari Sambo, who is in his late 80s. A virtual human library of akonting lore and Jola culture, Sagari is now our only source for traditional akonting music in Gambia as it was played here for generations."
--Daniel Jatta
When Daniel first began his work, there were very few young Jola musicians interested in the traditional music of the akonting. Like many other folk musical traditions throughout West Africa, the centuries-old Jola tradition of making and playing the akonting soon found itself on the "endangered species list."
Recognizing this fact, Daniel set for himself the task of not only learning how to play the instrument but also to research and document the lore and tradition of the akonting. No one had done this before.
While Daniel conducted his work to preserve and perpetuate the akonting in Gambia, the instrument was faring much better in neighboring Casamance (southern Senegal), the crucible of the tradition. In the '90s, younger musicians like Sana Ndiaye-- best known for his work with the Dakar-based African Hip Hop group Gokh Bi System aka GBS-- were taking up the akonting and presenting it to broader audiences. Yet, Casamance tradition-bearers like Ekona Jatta and Remi Jatta were still unknown outside of their villages and their music was not documented.
To address this situation, Daniel-- with the help of Ulf Jägfors and other associates and supporters in Gambia, Sweden, Britian, and America-- established The Akonting Center for Senegambian Folk Music in the village of Mandinary, Gambia, which opened its doors in July 2006. This initiative is a grassroots, non-governmental, community-centered effort. The Akonting Center's primary mission to research, document, and perpetuate the various string instrument traditions of the Senegambia region. It's also serves as a viable venue for local traditional musicians and instrument makers.
For more information, please visit: www.myspace.com/akonting
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