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Dogfeathers - Posted - 12/19/2023: 18:08:36
This last Sunday (Dec. 17th) on "60 Minutes" there was a segment on Gnawa music from Morocco. One of the talented musicians played a instrument called a Gimbri with a lot of similarities to the banjo. It had 3 strings, long neck with cords tied across the neck acting as a nut for each string, wooden pot with a hide head of some sort and a bridge and tailpiece similar to gourd type banjos. It also had a short string part way up the neck and he played it with down strokes like frailing.
cbsnews.com/news/ancient-gnawa...anscript/
ObsidianSpike - Posted - 12/19/2023: 19:02:56
By some coincidence, I recently found out about Gnawa music myself when looking into the "banya dance" mentioned in Kristina Gaddy's "Well of Souls." The band Gnawa Diffusion has members who play both the gimbri and the banjo (though I don't believe their song "Banya-Dance" features either instrument).
Edited by - ObsidianSpike on 12/19/2023 19:11:46
davidppp - Posted - 12/19/2023: 23:05:48
According to Michael Miles (clawhammer player extraodinaire), it's called a hajuj: youtube.com/watch?v=Mn8T5ZQn8K0 . He's got a good story to go with it, too.
Bob Buckingham - Posted - 12/20/2023: 05:05:20
There is a whole family of these banjo like instruments around the world. There is pretty well documented history of the banjo coming from West Africa nations as a idea, since the folks who came here from there were kind of limited in what they brought. After arriving in the Caribbean and in the colonies, they made instruments in this vein. Documentation of these instruments is found in the writings of slave holders and paintings by observers of the African American culture from the earliest days. The banjo is an icon of our melting pot of a culture.
