About Alkabli

Visits

My Visit to Norway

Hello. . Honorable friends.

What a pleasure to meet you and sing for you this evening. No need to introduce myself in detail as I assume by now my profile is within your reach. I am thankful to your presence and I am most grateful to Marianne Boe of the Centre for Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at the University of Bergen and for Dr. Mahmoud Salih Osman Salih who made it possible for me to meet and talk to your good selves. Being music composer, singer and a poet I have always admired those people who kept the World tenderly inside their loving hearts. Those who cared much for peace and have always been anti to wars and bloodshed. Those who cared much for the preservation of the wild life and ecology in our old globe. Those who are able to feel deeply the beauties of colours and respond emotionally to great music. Those who shiver down to the marrow at the sight of a small poor girl in rags imploring for food and shelter. And I am sure that your good selves belong to those humanitarian souls that can feel profoundly the joys and miseries of life and work hard for the benevolent promotion of life in our world. Your leading concern to attend and help in such activities is a good proof for what I am saying now. Dr. Mahmoud Salih, the man behind this activity, belonged to a family famous in Sudan for uncountable useful achievements. Now, Abdel Karim Mirghani’s cultural center at Omdurman and the Sudanese elementary school in London are but some of the unparalleled achievements of Dr. Mahmoud and members of his family. And from here, from this edifice of education, the University of Bergen, I would like to extend my heartily greetings and good wishes to his most able team consisting of the wonderfully great scholar Dr. Hassan Abbashar El Tayeb, Imad and Kamal at Omdurman centre and to Dr. Ahmed Bedri and his assistants in London. Abdel Karim Mirghani’s cultural centre at Omdurman has published tens of books in Arabic and in English written by Sudanese and British writers. In the last ten years the Sudanese school in London under the supervision of Dr. Ahmed Bedri has contributed wonderfully towards the education of Sudanese and non-Sudanese people.

For sure, our present occasion under the sponsorship of the University of Bergen is an added credit to the numerous credits won by this pioneer University and also an added valuable upper step in the ladder of Dr. Mahmoud’s achievements. It is the importance of documentation. Since my first lecture about Sudanese heritage and folklore in 1960 I have been stressing mainly on three issues:

1- Documentation.

2- Diversity and Integration.

3- Arts as invaluable assets in our lives.

Capturing the illuminating glimpses of the past is capturing the fruitful experiences of the ancestors. But we have to give equal percentages for our concern about the past, the present and the future. Regarding diversity and diversified countries I used to mention that diversity is strength but a conditional one. Without the feelings of oneness, common interest and harmonious existence such countries shall suffer from the awful problems of the party spirit leading to the unavoidable conflicts, wars and bloodshed. In my old lectures, while talking about diversity in Sudan, I was very optimistic. I used to quote the words “ Sudan is the melting pot of Africa”. This is natural in the co-existence of oneness and harmonious life in such diversified countries. Far from understanding this golden rule which ought to govern popular diversity, the description of life in such countries shall be, “The boiling not melting pot”. The British who were in charge of the administration of the Sudan for almost 57 years wrote tremendously and generously almost about every thing in Sudan. Most of them were graduated from Oxford University. With unflinching resolution they outlived the unbearable difficulties and hardships of life in the wild parts of Sudan and in spite of the hardships they have faced they wrote about the people, tradition, languages, music, soil, plantation, education, wild life, domestic animals, nature and folklore. Some of them spoke the languages of the tribes they worked with. I have met a group of those administrators at Durham University in 1991 during the Sudanese Studies Symposium. While talking to them I felt that in spite of their old age they were tremendously enjoying recalling their memoirs and their youthful days in Sudan. Many of them loved Sudan and Sudanese people. This could be clearly felt in the prayer written by Sir Douglas New-bold for the people of Sudan while he was Governor of Kordofan province. At the last part of his prayer he implored earnestly to the Almighty God to “ pour into their hearts and minds thy most precious gift of understanding so that they may bring peace into their feuds, justice into their councils and loving kindness into their homes and may cast away the works of darkness from their lives – Amen”. Now, like many other Sudanese people I feel very grateful to Dr. Mahmoud for publishing these treasures of experience which ought to have been published long ago. Now, to enrich this invaluable step of awareness I wish to witness a full advocacy for the encouragement of continuous debates and discussions in the Sudanese daily news-papers and Universities in regard to the said published material.

Regarding our Sudanese music it is mainly based on the five notes scales. The pentatonic (black) keys on the piano. It is the type of music used in many African and Asian countries and could be found in the old Japanese Kabuki. Some of the music scholars believed that this type of music is the natural type of music for human-beings. European full scales, counter point, harmony and anarmony together with the Persian, Turkish and Arabic ( Mogamaat) are considered as promotional achievements. Also, I came to know that our type of music goes far back to the Nubian or may be to the Phaironic Era. Now, our Sudanese music is influential in Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia, Northern Nigeria, Chad and other countries in West Africa. Talking about the variety of beats I can safely say that Sudan is the country of the most colourful rhythms. It is natural to find such unlimited rich and colourful rhythms in a so geographically and ethnically diversified country. In eastern and southern Sudan people used to use certain beats and instruments as means of communication. Such tunes and signals were used by the tribes for warning, disclosure of important events or invitation purposes. The influence of environment could always be felt in our Sudanese arts especially the colourful beats. In the camel rearing nomadic environments we find what I used to call the camel walk beat. In cow rearing areas like the Baggara and Nuba of the Nuba mountains in western Sudan some of the leading beats are Al Hasees and Al Mardoom and the Kambala beats which resemble the ox trod. Even while the Nuba are dancing the Kambala dance they are wearing ox horns on their heads. For them the ox is a symbol of strength. The images in our old Sudanese singing have always been taken from the surrounding environment. Those who lived beside the Nile compared a brave man to a crocodile while those who lived in other areas compared him to a lion or an eagle or a cobra or a thunderbolt. A graceful and beautiful girl is described as a gazelle or a pigeon or a green branch tenderly bending down a young palm tree. A cunning person is compared to a fox, and so on. The drum is the main and major musical instrument in our singing and music. It is the instrument that governs the dancing. The drum is found in all parts of Sudan and in almost all types of singing, including the religious singing in Christian and Islamic environments. Generally, in our music and singing the African influence is noticeably reflected especially in the love of movement and dancing. This could be one of the main reasons for the spread of our music and singing in the neighboring countries mentioned above.

I am thankful to you all and to my dear friends the highly talented musicians Mohamadya, Zaki, Al Fihail and Aatif the drummer.

Abel Kareem A. El Kabli