Concert: African Karimba Ensemble November 9, 2005

The Carleton College music department will present a karimba recital on Thursday, Nov. 10, at noon in the Carleton Gould Library Athenaeum. Students of the karimba class taught by Melinda Russell, director of karimba and mbira ensembles, will perform several pieces from a traditional repertoire. The pieces will be primarily cyclical, featuring a basic ostinato that is gradually varied by the players. The event is free and open to the public.

The ensemble is part of a one credit class focusing on the 15-key Shona karimba from Zimbabwe. Students of the class learn the fundamentals of both solo and group playing from the instrument?s traditional repertoire.

The karimba, a type of mbira instrument found across sub-Saharan Africa, is sometimes referred to as a ?thumb piano.? Popular with the Wanyika people of eastern Zimbabwe, the instrument is relatively easy to play with a modern repertoire. The playing technique involves plucking the lower row of keys with the thumb nails of one?s hands while the upper row of keys are plucked with the index finger on the right hand and the thumb on the left hand.

Russell specializes in ethnomusicology, and has studied a variety of musical traditions in North America, Africa and the Caribbean. She has published articles on reggae and musical taste, on choral music in an Illinois city, and has coedited the books ?Community of Music? and ?In the Course of Performance: Studies in the World of Musical Improvisation.? She also is the book review editor for the journal Ethnomusicology. Russell received her bachelor?s degree from Simon?s Rock Early College, her masters in ethnomusicology from the University of Minnesota and her doctorate from the University of Illinois.

For more information and disability accommodations, call the Carleton music department at (507) 646-4347.