I Drift Off Into Throat-Singing And Other Curiosities

Enough politics for the moment. Between the feckless Democrats, caught between the reflexive leftism of their activists and the fact that they are no longer the party of government, and the Republicans, who seem unable to lead and bereft of principles, I'd just as soon take a break.

So I drifted (my daughter wonders how) into a consideration of Central Asian throat-singing, which got some press when the redoubtable Richard Feynman took an interest in the small Central Asian country of Tuva. There seem to be traditions of throat-singing in much of Central Asia, and indications that something similar (but not quite the same) among the Inuit.

Apparently, the technique is periodically rediscovered, for the website has links to Xhosa (South Africa) and cowboy versions of the art, which involves the production of a deep tone in the throat and one or more harmonic tones in the mouth at the same time. Thus, one singer can produce more than one note. The singers could accompany themselves on their ponies without carrying musical instruments.

Whether this technique, to us, is more than an ethnomusicological curiosity, is in question, but curious it is. Check out the videos and MP3s. If you like it, you can get on-line lessons, and as the ads in the back of the comic books used to say, amaze your friends.