Moving Song and Singing Moves 14 December 2011 Dr Amanda
Villepastour recently visited Philadelphia to present some of
her world-leading research to the Society of Ethnomusicology
(SEM) conference, held jointly with the Congress on Research
into Dance (CORD). Amanda drew on a decade of musical research
in Nigerian and Cuban sites along with fresh fieldwork in
Nigeria in 2011 for her presentation on the role of movement in
transatlantic Yorùbá music. Music among the Yorùbá in Nigeria
and their descendants in Cuba has received considerable
scholarly focus, yet – with some notable exceptions – relatively
little attention has been paid to dance, movement and gesture
within these related traditions. Amanda said: “Movement is
firmly embedded in both transatlantic musical and religious
traditions. Among the Yorùbá people, music intermeshes
heightened speech, song, instrumental music, gesture and dance.
“While some Nigerian Yorùbá songs and recitations are
accompanied by hand and arm gestures in a performance style n