UNINTERRUPTED CONVERSATIONS WITH OUR EEGUN: PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS FOR METHODOLOGICAL APPROACHES TO THE RESEARCH OF AFRICAN MUSIC AND THE MUSIC OF JOHN COLTRANE

Abstract

African music and its musicians from the Pharaonic periods to Mali to the Mississippi Delta to the South Bronx have contributed some of the most lasting and influential cultural creations known. The music and musicians of Africa have been studied as early as the early 18th century. As interest in African music grew so did the discipline of ethnomusicology. Ethnomusicology has sought to understand, interpret and catalog the various areas of African music. In the United States interest in the music as a continuation of African culture was also sought after and investigated as an important area of research. The main objective of this project is to help expand the methodological approaches in the study of African Diasporan musical cultures and their practitioners. The author undertook a critical examination of the previous works on the subject made by both Continental and Diasporan African scholars, in addition to fieldwork in the United States and Africa (Ghana). Through considering the work songs of Pharaonic Egypt, the cosmogram of the Bantu-Kongo and the life of John Coltrane in particular this proposed work articulates new methodological tools in the research of African music and musicians.