Hugh Tracey And The International Library Of AFRICAN MUSIC - For Future Generations

We have called Hugh Tracey legendary. And his legend will grow in the decades to come.

Hugh Tracey is the guardian of African music, a man who dedicated his entire life to the preservation, promotion and documentation of traditional African music for later generations. He did that at a time, when nobody else thought of it.

Hugh Tracey had such an exciting and fulfilled life, that just a couple of sentences will simply not do. To give you an idea who this man was and how he became this impressive figure known by African music lovers, we are looking at his early years from 1921 to 1947 today.

Hugh Tracey became The Guardian Of African Music. His images and his recordings of indigenous African music have been one of the first in Southern Africa

 Hugh Tracey arrived in 1921 at the age of 18 in what was then called Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) from Devonshire in England.

This young man had come to work on his brother's tobacco plantation in the Gutu district, near Chivu. He came like many other white people to make a living and to find a new life in colonial Africa. But soon his interest and passion in African music lead him on an entirely different path.

Hugh Tracey's Recordings Of African Music are Amongst The First That Had Been Done On The African Continent

As early as 1929 Hugh Tracey took 14 young Karanga musicians 500 km South to Johannesburg to be recorded by Columbia, London.

These are the first recordings of Karanga music ever to be published!

Soon after that several of these recordings were played as opening music at the historic first concert of African American musicians at the Carnegie Hall in NYC. 

Five of the original 16 recorded items remain in the ILAM archive (International Library Of African Music) of which Hugh Tracey became later the founder. 

In 1931 Hugh was awarded a Carnegie fellowship grant to study the "indigenous music of Southern Rhodesia". From 1932 to July 1933 he recorded over 600 items in the field on plain aluminium discs with an early model of reporting gear.

Hugh Tracey recording Karanga musicians in a Cape Town studio in March 1933

In 1933 he traveled by train to Cape Town with 16 Karanga musicians to take advantage of a temporary visit of a team of professional recording engineers.

In 1934/35 Hugh Tracey began a professional broad casting career at the SABC in Cape Town.

From 1936 to 1947 he was the director of the SABC radio in Durban.

Hugh Tracey is the founder of ILAM - International Library Of African Music

Hugh tracey was never too shy to use his own money for what he was passionate about. 

In 1940 Hugh Tracey started out on a self funded trip to discover Chopi Timbila Xylophone orchestras in Mozambique. He was so impressed with the size of the orchestras and dance troupes and the sophistication of the music, that he brought a group of six timbila players to Durban by boat to make quality recordings of their music. 

He studied thoroughly the compositional and playing techniques of Chopi music, its instrument technology and its musical form in order to write his by now famous and very much respected book "Chopi Musicians" which was published in 1948 in the Portuguese language. 

Hugh was fluent in Portueguese. "Chopi Musicians" was also published in English by the Oxford Press.

A Chopi Timbila Orchestra consisting of hundreds of players in Mozambique - Image by Hugh Tracey

The field trips that Hugh Tracey conducted were rather unusual for the time. 

First of all, because generally the interest in indigenous African music amongst white people in Africa specifically and in the world was very low at the beginning of the 20 th. century. Why record African music? Who would listen to it?

African indigenous music was considered as simple, repetitive and disharmonious by many at a time when Victor Silvester And His Ballroom Orchestra rocked the world with his slow fox trots and quicksteps. A distinct contrast.

Secondly these recordings were not easy to do. 

Indigenous African music was played were the people lived, in the villages of Africa, on the fields and in their homes. To record their music you had to come in close contact with them and being allowed to participate in their ceremonies and their rituals. Speak their language and overcome suspicion.

"Their Words Are Never Meant For The Ears Of Outsiders", Hugh Tracey

In 1948 Hugh Tracey wrote:

 "The Songs of Africa only composed for the delectation the village, the district, or at most, the tribe are a kind of aural portraiture. They reveal African thought and character more clearly than other means....for discovering what they think and feel, what they consider important in their social and political life, their humour desires, regrets and despair. They are expressed in words never meant for the ears of outsiders." 

(from his book Lalela Zulu - 100 Zulu lyrics).

A Chopi Player

Hugh Tracey On A Field Trip

Hugh Tracey's team had to travel to remote areas with recording equipment, that is  exhibited in museums today.

The unavoidable colonial outfit of the time

Recording equipment similar to the one Hugh Tracey used

A stop watch used in recording

 Hugh Tracey's typical field expedition from 1948 onwards consisted of three vehicles: a recording van, (with EMI, Lyrec and other lathes and recorders), a truck with a 220 Volt diesel generator trailer, and a caravan. 

He had a minimum crew of four or more, including a sound engineer and two driver/field assistants Sam Shabalala and Daniel Mabuto.

His typical field expedition from 1948 onwards made use of three vehicles

Recording in the field throughout the Sub-Saharan Africa wherever the music was being performed was not a simple task. Tracey had to invent a specially costumized roof raised high enough so his recording engineer could stand in the recording van, and had to have an engine strong enough to pull a generator that weighed half a ton to provide the electricity required for recording.

The noisy generator had to be set up out of ear shot; this meant a long electrical cable had to be run from the generator to the truck where the sound engineer controlled the recording equipment.

Tracey;s recording technique was to always hold the microphone in his right hand, and his stopwatch in his left hand. With the microphone on a short boom he moved around among the musicians following the sounds to capture the essence of each performance with a good sound balance and thereby produce field recordings of exceptional quality.

As technology shrank so did the team. His last recordings of Princes Constance Magogo were made with no assistance with a battery powered Nagra III tape recorder.

 

Hugh Tracey At Work

And in the end: he shook black people's hands - this was not done at the time. 

"He was one of the few white people in Johannesburg who would shake a black man's hand as a natural thing to do". (David Coplan).

Hugh Tracey Recording

Hugh continued to research Chopi music throughout his life and career and he produced two films on timbila xylophone construction techniques Chopi Music Parts 1 and 2 in 1955. 

His son Andrew followed in his footsteps and extended his own research on Chopi Music to the nyanga panpipe tradition.

Hugh Tracey had a deep passion and fascination for Chopi music and in 1948 he published his book "Chopi Musicians, Their Music, Instruments And Poetry" in Portuguese And English

He produced two films about the construction of timbila xylophone techniques Chopi Music Parts 1 and 2 in 1955

Hugh Tracey and Andrew Tracey recording Hera Mbira players in Mozambique

But Hugh Tracey did not stop there. 

Although most of his research took place in Southern Africa he ventured into other African regions with his field trips as far as DRC. 

In 1948 he undertook field excursion to Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), Northern Rhodesia (Zambia), Northern Transvaal, Natal and South Africa.

In 1949 field excursions to Mozambique, Southern Congo, Malawi (Nyasaland) Southern Rhodesia and Northern Rhodesia were conducted by him and his team. 

The images we have published here originate from some of these trip and are the property of Hugh Tracey. 

They have left a deep impression on us because they show the extent and the scope of Hugh Tracey's work and the legacy he has created for his life and left behind for others with the intent to enable them to understand African music. 

He was one of the first people of the last century who had a deep understanding of African music. 

He understood the value of indigenous African music and it is his recordings we are collecting today and playing for you in our magazine.

Young men of the Medje Chieftancy, Mekere people playing wooden trumpets in DRC

We know about Hugh's work since a long time but when we discovered the scope and the depth of research during a visit at the small East London museum, that was hosting an exhibition about him and his life's work, we decided that we would dress this content into a story and bring it you, our readers.

Africa is the cradle of mankind and African music is world heritage.

Zulu Chief Mohlutini (Centre) leading the dance near Mahlabatini, KwaZulu Natal

Balele Pygmies playing cylindrical drums and a slit drum

Traditional Dancers In The Witwatersrand Gold Mines

 In 1947 the final break through for his work came when with the support of Gallo records owner Eric Gallo he established the African Music Research Unit in Roodeport, as part of Gallo's operations. From 1947 to 1953 Gallo Records pressed several hundred 78rpm shellac records, judged at the time to be the most commercially valuable of Hugh Tracey's recordings. 

In 1948 Hugh Tracey established the African Music Society Newsletter which he ran until 1953!

In 1958 Hugh Tracey recorded the famous Zulu bow player Princess Constance Magogo Dinuzulu, the mother of chief Mangosutho Buthelezi. 

The 1958 recordings are found on Tracey's  LP "Music of Africa" series No.37

In 1958 Tracey recorded the "The Zulu Songs Princess Constance Magogo Dinuzulu"

Hugh Tracey recording the "Zulu Songs Of Princess Constance Magogo Dinuzulu" with only one Nagra III tape recorder

Hugh Tracey recording - as technology shrank so did his team!

Story to be continued tomorrow.