Adama Koueta

 

Yesterday, I briefly talked about the calabash, and mentioned that, when harvested mature and dried, the fruit can be used for making smoking pipe, utensils, and also music instruments.

In this (short) 2015 movie by Peter Teys via Vimeo, the musician Adama Koueta from Burkina Faso is playing the ngoni, a handmade string instrument, made from a calabash, goat skin, wood and with nylon strings.

Ngoni is a traditional lute found throughout West Africa. Played by griots – a West African historian, storyteller, praise singer, poet and/or musician, and more generally a repository of oral tradition, the instrument is still largely reserved for ceremonial purposes.