The relationship between cultures is often found in music through instruments, text, and various other components of musicality. Such a relationship and bridge between the African and American cultures continues to exist as exemplified in the content of modern day music and tribal music of African nations. During his presentation "African Culture and Slavery in the American South: An African Point of View" Dr. Ibrahima Seck elaborated on the similarities of music from his native home of Senegal and the southern region of the United States.
One of the most interesting similarities and coincidents between these two regions was not a relationship between people or traditions, but more simply, a geographic correlation. To begin his presentation Dr. Seck provided a map of the delta area of Senegal and the more commonly known Mississippi Delta region. Not only were these two areas connected with similar geographic proponents, but also surprisingly, African people from the Moor and Fulani tribes of the Senegal Delta were imported into American and sent to work as slaves in the southeastern United States delta. Although there are many other social and cultural elements that attest to the correlation of the music of these two regions, I found this geographic model most surprising for its parallelism.
In order to help prove many of his historical and cultural arguments, Dr. Seck provided one of the most influential pieces of evidence: the music of Gelel Kumba. Although Mr. Kumba did not speak much English it did not harm the validity of his message. Through his music and the music of his ancestors, the correlation between African music and American music was astounding. While the first two pieces that Mr. Kumba played were reminiscent of early African American music, it was not until he performed his last piece that I was fully convinced (this piece was not played in the latter presentation).
