Zimbabwe Music Bibliography
(Annotated):


Berliner, Paul
1978/93 The Soul of Mbira: music and traditions of the Shona people of Zimbabwe. Berkeley: University of California Press.


Paul Berliner's monograph on the mbira dzavadzimu is a comprehensive work on the instrument, the music, and the social contexts in which it is (traditionally) used. He discusses how people learn/ how it is taught, how it is made, and the meanings and beliefs associated with mbira. This work is of central importance to my website project, as it is the major source on the mbira.


Santoro, Gene
1997 "The Lion of Zimbabwe - Thomas Mapfumo." Stir it up: musical mixes from roots to jazz. New York: Oxford University Press.


This book examines the effects on music as it "crisscrosses" the globe, in a shrinking world. Santoro looks at how musicians from various parts of the world appropriate certain elements from other music. The chapter on Thomas Mapfumo, one of the creators of chimurenga music-guitars played in an mbira style-is of particular interest.



Turino, Tom
"Nationalists, Cosmopolitans and Popular Music in Zimbabwe." University of Chicago Press.

Reflections on how the mbira came to be identified with the nationalist movement, which may also be a factor in explaining its popularity in North America and Europe.

(Not Annotated):


No Author listed
1995 "Mixed reviews: the cultural scene in Harare." The Economist. v. 337 Dec. 9 86-7.


Asante, Kariamu Welsh
1993 "Zimbabwean Dance: An Aesthetic Analysis of the Jerusarema and Muchongoyo Dances (Canonical Theory)." DAI. 54-02A, Page 0350.


Asante, Kariamu W.
1985 "The Jerusarema Dance of Zimbabwe." Journal of Black Studies. 15:4, African and African-American Dance, Music, and Theatre. pp. 381-403.


Beach, D. N.
1979 "'Chimurenga' : the Shona rising of 1896-97." Journal of African History. 20:3 395-420.


Berliner, Paul
1980 "John Kunaka, mbira maker." African Arts. 14:1 61-67, 88.


Berliner, Paul
1976 "The Poetic Song Texts Accompanying the 'Mbira Dzavadzimu'." Ethnomusicology. September: 451.


Berliner, Paul F.
1993 "The Relationship between the Mbira Player and the Mbira." Reprint from The Soul of Mbira. In: Anderson, Richard L. (ed.); Field, Karen L. (ed.); Brody, J. J. (preface). Art in Small-Scale Societies: Contemporary Readings. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall: 179-86.


Blacking, John and Thomas N. Huffman
1985 "The Great Enclosure and Domba." Man, New Series, 20:3 542-545.


Brenner, Klaus-Peter
1997 Chipendani und Mbira: Musikinstrumente, nicht-begriffliche Mathematik und die Evolution der harmonischen Progressionen in der Musik der Shona in Zimbabwe. Gottingen, Germany: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.


Brown, Ernest D.
1994 "The Guitar and the mbira: Resilience, Assimilation, and Pan-Africanism in Zimbabwean Music." World of Music. 36:2 73-117.


Brown, Ernest D
1994 "Central African Republic: Music for Xylophones Zaire: The Music of the Nande Zimbabwe: The Ndebele People." Ethnomusicology. Autumn 548-551.


de Lowerntal, Elizabeth
1998 "Curricular Innovations in Traditional Music: A Case Study of Zimbabwean Music Teacher Education." British Journal of Music Education. 15:2 171-180.


Dube, C.
1996 "The Changing context of African Music performance in Zimbabwe." Zambezia 23:2 99-120.


Edmond, John
1982 The story of Troopiesongs and the Rhodesian Bush War. Johannesburg: Roan Antelope Music.


Eyre, Banning
1994 Note: I could not find the exact name of this article, but it is on Chimurenga bands and appeared in Guitar Player magazine in 1994. Happy Hunting!!


Eyre, Banning
1999 "Joshua Dube's 'Shanje'." Guitar Player. 33:1:349 130-31


Eyre, Banning
1999 "The Revolutionary Bass of Allan Mwale." Bass Player 10:10 26, 28, 30.


Impey, Angela Marguerite
1992 "They want us with Salt and Onions: Women in the Zimbabwean Music Industry." DAI. 53-12A, Page 4380.


Jones, Claire
1992 Making music: Musical Instruments of Zimbabwe past and present. Zimbabwe: Academic Books.


Kaemmer, J.E.
1989 "Social Power and Music Change Among the Shona." Ethnomusicology. 31-45.


Kauffman, Robert
1979 "Tactility as an Aesthetic Consideration in African Music." In: Blacking, John (ed.); Kealiinohomoku, Joann W. (ed.); Tax, Sol (pref.). The Performing Arts: Music and Dance. The Hague: Mouton: 251-253.


Kauffman, Robert A.
1984 "Multipart relationships in Shona vocal music (Zimbabwe)." Selected Reports in Ethnomusicology 145-159.


Kauffman, Robert
1984 "Multipart Relationships in Shona Vocal Music." In: Nketia, J. H. Kwabena (ed. & introd.); Dje Dje, Jacqueline Cogdell (ed.); Forter, James (pref.). Studies in African Music. Los Angeles: Univ. of California, Los Angeles: 145-159.


Klinger, R.
1996 "From Glockenspiel to Mbira, an Ethnography of Multicultural Practice in Music Education." Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education. 29-36.


Krause, Drew Stafford
1993 "Musical Ambiguity in Analysis and Composition: Problems of Pattern, Value, Form, and Structure." DAI. Note: This article investigates mbira as one example.


Kreutzer, Natalie Jones
1997 "The Nature of Music Acquisition among Selected Shona Speaking People of Rural Zimbabwe as Reflected in the Vocal Productions of Children from Birth to Seven Years." DAI. 58-08A, Page 3059.


Kruger, Jaco
1989 "Rediscovering the Venda Ground-Bow." Ethnomusicology: Journal of the Society for Ethnomusicology. 33:3 391-404.


Kubik, Gerhard
1964 "Generic names for the Mbira; a contribution to Hugh Tracey's article 'A case for the name Mbira'." African Music. 3:3 25-36. Notes: Supplements Tracey's article in African Music, 2:4, 1961.


Kubik, Gerhard,
1988 "Nsenga/Shona harmonic patterns and the San heritage in Southern Africa." Ethnomusicology 32 39-76.


Lusk, Jon
1997 "Zimbabwaves." Folk Roots 19:173:5 35, 37.


Maraire, Dumisani Abraham
1990 "The Position of Music in Shona 'Muszimu' (Ancestral Spirit) Possession (Zimbabwe)." DAI. 51-09A, Page 2917.


Marx, Shirley
1990 "A Zimbabwean mbira: A Tradition in African Music and its Potential for Music Education." British Journal of Music Education. March: 25.


Njoku, Johnston Akuma-Kalu
1992 "Nature and Organizing Principles of African Music and the Emergence of Shona Catholic Mass Music in Zimbabwe." DAI. 53-09A, Page 3037.


Pongweni, Alec J. C.
1982 Songs that won the liberation war. Harare: College Press.


Siwela, Elais W. M.
1979 Ngoma dze kunyumwa kwe Mashona: songs of social consciousness of the Shona of Zimbabwe. Nairobi: Institute of African Studies.


Summers, Roger
1966 "The Iron Age of Southern Rhodesia." Current Anthropology. 7:4 463-484.


Thompson, Donald
1975/6 "A new world Mbira: the Caribbean Marimbula." African Music. 5:4 140-148.


Tracey, Andrew
1970 "The Matepe Mbira music of Rhodesia." African Music. IV:4 37-61.


Tracey, Andrew
1972 "The original African Mbira?" African Music. 5:2 85-104.


Tracey, Andrew
1963 "Three tunes for 'Mbira dza vadzimu'." African Music. 3:2 23-26.


Tracey, Andrew
1969 "The tuning of mbira reeds." African Music. 4:3 96-100.


Tracey, Hugh T.
1969 "The mbira class of African instruments in Rhodesia (1932)." African Music. 4:3 78-95.


Turino, Thomas
1998 "The Mbira, Worldbeat, and the International Imagination." The World of Music. 40:2 85-106.


Williams, Linda F
1997 "'Straight-Fashioned Melodies': The Transatlantic Interplay of American Music in Zimbabwe." American Music. 15:3 285-304.


Williams, Linda Faye
1996 "The Impact of African-American Music on Jazz in Zimbabwe: An Exploration in Radical Empiricism." Dissertation Abstracts International. Section A: The Humanities and Social Sciences (DAIA), Ann Arbor, MI. 56:11.


Williams, B Michael
1997 "Getting Started With Mbira dzaVadzimu." Percussive Notes. 35:4 38-49.


Zilberg, Jonathan
Forthcoming "At the George Hotel: There I Sat Down at Home Again." In: Fox, Aaron, and Christine Yano eds., Songs out of Place.


Zilberg, Jonathan.
1995 "Yes, it's true: Zimbabweans love Dolly Parton." Journal of Popular Culture. v. 29 111-25.


Zindi, Fred
1985 Roots rocking Zimbabwe. Gweru: Mambo Press.


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