PVD WORLD MUSIC INSTITUTE

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TITLE: Finding the Spirit of Inanga: A Gallery of Traditional Music Instruments 

DATE: April 29th to June 30th, 2022

First Opening Reception April 29th, 2022 

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Performance and Q&A with Yacouba Diabate - Kora

 

Second Opening Reception May 26th, 2022 

Performance and Q&A with Dr. Silas Pinto - Berimbau & Atabaque

 

Third Opening Reception June 23rd, 2022 

Virtual Performance and Q&A with Inanga Player Olympe

Performance TBA

 

LOCATION: The Gallery at Machines with Magnets, 400 main st, Pawtucket, RI USA

 

Amahoro/Greetings

 

Thank you for all you support Finding the spirit of Inanga: A Gallery of Traditional Musical Instruments journey started in 2018 and we are excited to bring this project to the community. We thank you for your support. 

 

This event provides a cultural learning experience, taking visitors on a spectacular journey through time and space, featuring unique and significant musical instruments and other music related artifacts from around the globe. This interactive musical showcase  also offers the exciting opportunity to learn directly from the musicians who own these beautiful pieces of cultural history through three specially curated music education sessions. Our goal is to foster an appreciation for timeless musical traditions and share the rich musical history and knowledge carried by our master musicians and their instruments.

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IMPACT AND CONTRIBUTIONS 

 

Finding the Spirit of Inanga: A Gallery of Traditional Music Instruments features musical instruments from Africa and the African Diaspora. It provides an unparalleled global musical experience that is enriching, inspiring, and exciting for people of all ages and ethnicities. As an educational and cultural learning experience, include expert workshops where master instrumentalists will teach interested participants how to understand these instruments. 

 

The gallery showcase is free and open to the public from April 29th to June 30th, 2022 to encourage cross cultural dialogue and to foster cultural learning and sharing among the diverse inhabitants of the City of Pawtucket and the state of Rhode Island. 

HISTORICAL AND CULTURAL SIGNIFICANCE 

 

In addition to serving the public broadly, the Finding Inanga gallery event will be of special cultural and historical significance to the Burundian families living in Rhode Island. Providence County is home to over one thousand Burundian families who moved to Rhode Island from refugee camps in Tanzania between 2006 and 2018. Among these families are a number of elderly Burundians who used to play the Inanga regularly while living in Burundi. However, since their displacement and subsequent relocation to Rhode Island, they have not been able to connect with this important cultural instrument or share their musical gifts with the community more broadly. Although  some aspects of this cultural heritage are still passed down orally, this event presents a unique opportunity to harness the folk knowledge within this community and share its rich culture with other Rhode Islanders. By hosting this event with the Burundian community of Providence, we hope to share its rich Burundian culture  with  our fellow city residents , through a  free event that is available and accessible to all who live here.

 

In the long-term, PVD World Music hopes to establish a permanent gallery and workshop to showcase the traditional folk instruments of Africa to the community, and share  knowledge about  the rich cultural  traditions they come from. Through the use of digital archives alongside tangible cultural artifacts and materials, the gallery will allow  attendees to embark on a spectacular musical journey around Africa without leaving Rhode Island.

 

Curating this event is a part of PVD World Music Institute’s ongoing mission to celebrate, promote and enrich the musical traditions and arts of African refugees and immigrants in Rhode Island for present and future generations. We thank our partners, whose generous support has made this event possible: Machines with Magnets, The Center for the Study of Slavery at Brown University and Justice and Rhode Island State Councils for the Arts.

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