ABSTRACT
There is no doubt that our enjoyment of African music is greatly enhanced when we know what the songs are about and the setting from which they spring. It is almost impossible for foreigners to pick up the words of an African song as it is sung. I have not yet met one who could. We have to get the singers to repeat the words to us at dictation speed and then ask them to sing the song over again. It is then much easier to follow. But beginners must be warned that there is a strict routine to be adhered to in this operation or else whole lines will be left out and lyrically important repeats omitted. The singers themselves often have difficulty in remembering exactly what they do sing unless they hum the song over to themselves from the beginning and find out just what the words were. But this is not uncommon: we do the same ourselves. It takes time and patience to be certain you have the poetry down correctly. And even when you have your words down as correctly as may be, you find they have taken liberties with them which you will not find in the text-books. Poetic phraseology in the Bantu languages is as distinctive as poetic English or French, for example. The endings of words are particularly liable to slight alteration in song. Consequently, when taking down these Chopi lyrics I have been very careful to write what they sing, or appear to me to sing, and not always what they would say in conversation. Thus a word normally ending in -a may frequently be sung as -e. Names of persons and places are often so changed. The name of the Paramount Chief Vani Zavala may be changed to Vane Zavale, and Chopi become Chope. One is never certain when they will make the alteration and I have made no attempt to standardize. It is a phenomenon shared to my knowledge by both Karanga and 9Zulu people as well. An apparently incorrect suffix in poetry should be heard in song before making too hasty a correction. Locality also has to be remembered, for the singers constantly reminded me of their distinctive dialects.
