Venda ḽashu : Tshivenda songs, musical games and song stories

Abstract

The songs, musical games and song stories in this book originate from two sources. The first is a collection of songs I accumulated from 1983-1994 among Tshivenda-speaking people living in South Africa’s Limpopo Province. Children’s songs (nyimbo dza vhana) were not a primary objective of my study of Venda music, and so my encounters with them mostly were marked by chance. Perhaps my most memorable experience of children’s music-making occurred in the summer of 1988 when I was fishing in the Luvhuvhu River near the village of Tshiulungoma. I was joined by a few young boys who expressed keen interest in my fishing tackle. They got bored when I was unable to catch any fish, and started to shoot birds with their catapults. Their hunt took them into some trees where their animated chatter turned into singing. Their clear voices rang out in the warm, still afternoon. The song leader and chorus singers were sitting in different trees, and this emphasised the antiphonal structure of their song. And so my encounters with children’s music not only were serendipitous but also pleasant.