Utom: Summoning the Spirit: Music in the rboli ...

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Casal, T'boli Art in its Socio-Cultural. Context. Makati, Metro Manila: Filipinas Foundation, 1978. Additional information can be found on the Internet homepage of ...
REVIEWS

RECORDS I 203

each of the ensembles recorded, giving some general comments on the nature of the repertories. In the second section, he provides information about each of the pieces on the disc and lists personnel. CHARLES CAPWELL

Unh-ersity of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Utom: Summoning the Spirit: Music in the rboli Heartland. Recordings and annotations by Manolete Mora. Rykodisc RCD-10402. CD with 13 pages of notes in English and 2 b/w photographs of performers. No bibliography. 20 tracks recorded in the field. 67'07. 1997. This compilation is one of the very few sources on the music of the Tboli (T'boli, Tiboli, Tagabili). However, it is not a scientific edition in the tradi· tional sense, as the basic ethnographic information, the names of performers, and the places and dates of recording are only partly integrated in the commenting text, partly lacking at all. There are no musical transcriptions nor analytical comments. The list of recordings is confusing: the musical instruments can usually only be guessed from the tides, and indigenous names of some instruments are not mentioned at all throughout the whole commentary booklet. Musical instruments presented include two-stringed boat lute (hegelung), plucked bamboo zither (s 'l~), lip-valley flute (s 'loli), one-stringed spike fiddle (d'wegey), big suspended gongs (agung) played solo and in combination with gong chimes placed in a row (k'lintang), jaw's harp (!cubing) and small drum (t'nonggong). Only the reed pipe (feu) is not presented. The rich vocal music of the Tboli is only represented by two samples, one of which is an excerpt from the famous Tudbulu/ epic. As a whole, the selection of recordings as well as their sound quality are excellent, and the selected pieces represent the major genres of Tboli music, although the scope of presented vocal music is rather limited. Another strong point is the liner notes which give a good idea about the general situation of the Tboli. They are revealing on how the music is related to other areas ofTboli culture and especially to the sounds of nature. Very good performers, like those presented on this CD, can nowadays rarely be found among the cultural communities of Mindanao. Their performances make this CD a must for any CD collection on S>utheast Asian music. As there is no bibliography given and because the liner notes require some additional clarification, I would like to refer to two printed sources: [I] Manolete Mora, "The S>unding Pantheon of Nature. T'boli Instrumental Music in the Making of an Ancestral Symbol." In Acta Musico/ogica. Vol. LIX, 1987. Fasc. II, pp. 187-212. [2) GabrielS. Casal, T'boli Art in its Socio-Cultural Context. Makati, Metro Manila: Filipinas Foundation, 1978. Additional information can be found on the Internet homepage of the recording company: < http://www.rykodisc.com/3/features/world/ >. HANS BRANDEIS Berlin, Germany