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Listen…OKA!

liner notes
1) Birds & Women's Voices - This soundscape has been composed from an original dawn chorus recorded at Bai Hokou. The astonishing birds pattern is
complex and regular, and contains a bird species whose song produces a fixed tone that usually the Bayaka women imitate and tune to, when singing their
gathering songs.

Singers: Essandje, Singha, Mbombi, Gano, Banga


Soundscape field recordings and eco-acoustic composition by David Monacchi

2) Yetoo's Dream - Many Bayaka songs first come to them in dreams. Yetoo wakes up before dawn singing a new song, which is then taken up by others
improvising countermelodies, and soon a new polyphonic creation is born.

Composed by: Chris Berry and Yetu


Producer: Chris Berry
Lead Vocal: Yetu

3) Mboyo Flute - Mobila's flute playing was in integral part of nights at Yandoumbe, as he rose at two in the morning to play the flute while wandering through the
village. His death just after the shooting of OKA! signals the end of an ancient tradition.

Producer: Chris Berry


Flute Player: Mobila
Shaker and Mbira: Chris Berry
Recorded by Louis Sarno

4) Yonga: This song is named after Yonga who was a great improviser and quickly mastered modern recording techniques, like overdubbing vocals and singing to
western instruments. It was from Yonga that the others took their lead on this project. She is featured here in a song she created.

Composed by: Chris Berry and Yunga


Backing Vocals: Mawa, Badangba, Konje
Drums: Yandoumbe Drum Ensemble

5) Waterdrum - Makoondi, or drumming on water, is a specialty of the women. Men simply appear to be incapable of mastering the technique to the same degree
of proficiency. The music is made by cupping the hands and pushing down hard on the water, creating air bubbles that the water rushes in to fill, thereby colliding
with itself and producing a percussive sound.

Drummers: Mbombi, Singha, Mbanga, Essandje

6) Bottlefunk Girls - This is "Bambadoo", a newfangled dance which, although originating with the Mbororo (Fulani people) has been enthusiastically adopted by
the present generation of Bayaka children, who play it late at night after all the adults have gone to bed. This song tells about a promiscuous girl who was found
making love in the strangest of places.

Singers: Mbanga, Mobimba, Eluka, Bwamusenge, Singha


Drummers: Mokule, Lundi

7) Mua Solo - A love song sung by Essandje that may explain why she has so many suitors.

Composed by: Chris Berry and Essandje


Lead Vocals: Essendje
Back up Vocals: Yunga, Engoto, Bomente
Percussion: Chris Berry

8) Honeybee - This song is played on the harp-zithder, or "mondoume." It is usually very quiet and for this reason is most often played at night in forest camps,
where its gentle strains, with their amazing rhythmic subtleties, weave their way into sleepers' dreams..

Composed by: Chris Berry and Bayanga


Producer: Chris Berry

9) Congo Beat: This is a popular Bantu rhythm. The Bayaka have adopted it and made it their own and may have even outdone the grooves of their
predecessors.

Singers: Eluka, Singa, Bomenge

10) Monkeys Eating Fruits - A group of monkeys (Lophocebus Albigena) are eating and vocalizing in the canopies at Bai Hokou research camp. The recording
was done in a movement following the monkeys' trajectory, while they were accidentally throwing pieces of fruits toward the sound recordist.

Soundscape field recordings and eco-acoustic composition by David Monacchi

11) Tree Drum and Gano - The drum here is a living tree! The singing by Angende (Essandje's uncle) is some of the funkiest beat boxing ever. "Gano," is a form
of sung storytelling, and Angende is a master. The stories all concern events that took place in the olden days, when Koumba, god of the forest, was still a Bayaka
on earth, and all the animals were people.

Composed by: Chris Berry and Mbanda


Tree Drum: Mbanda
Percussion: Chris Berry
Gano Singers: Angende, and Yandoumbe Choral Singers

12) Bokete - You can hear how the bass picks up one of the Yetus dream song lines and the song takes off from there.

Composed by: Chris Berry and Yetu


Lead Vocals: Yetu
Backing Vocal: Singa

13) Walk in - This cue was intended to express the excitement and perils for the Bayaka of traveling outside the forest, through the Bantu Villages where they
were chased away, past the market selling monkey and other bush meat and finally to the new sawmill, where the trees from their forest are being cut and loaded
for sale.

Composed by: Chris Berry


Singers: Yandoumbe Choral Singers
Bass: Jesse Murphy
Co-Producer: Aaron Johnston

14) Esuma (Wild Yam) - This is a lullaby lead by the barren Essandje. Inability to have children is a serious plight for a Bayaka woman, which Essandje has
overcome with grace. All the children of Yandoumbe love to be held by her.

Composed by: Chris Berry and Essandje


Lead Vocal: Essandje
Backing Vocals: Yandoumbe Choral Singers
Drums: Yandoumbe Drum Ensemble

15) Song for thinking - Individual music is essentially vocal, although always accompanied by instruments. It is sung for the performer's own pleasure rather than
for any listeners. These songs might concern ancestor worship as readily as the woman one loves. They are plaintive songs or meditations, as in the case of the
song called "Piere," sung by two Gbaya men, each providing accompaniment on a sanza, and which is part of a repertoire know as songs for "thinking."

From the CD: Central African Republic, Auvidis Records

16) Elanda - Elanda is the traditional teenagers dance. The singing style, like the dancing, is high-energy: girls singing in high tones, boys providing a contrast with
deep rhythmic gutteral tones. Many an affair -- sometimes ending in marriage -- began during an elanda dance.

Singers: Yandoumbe Choral Singers


Composed by: The Bayaka

17) Molimo - The main instrument here is an earth bow, or "lingbindi." One of the simplest of all instruments, the earth bow consists of a single long string tied to a
sapling, which is bent over. The other end of the string is attached to a square of thick bark, which is placed over a hole in the ground, turning the earth itself into a
resonator. The plucked string has a lovely deep bass sound, and the riffs played on it usually have a jazz-like syncopation.

Composed by: Chris Berry and Bayaka Ancestors


Earth Bow Player: Mbanda
Bass: Jesse Murphy

18) Elephant Gentle Laments - An elephant vocalizes in the distance with foreground frogs and insects at Bai Dzanga. Notice also the water sounds produced by
several elephants sucking minerals from the sandy river, and the great natural sound reverberation generated from the high canopy trees of the forest front
surrounding the saline.

Soundscape field recordings and eco-acoustic composition by David Monacchi

19) Mua Mix

Composed by: Chris Berry and Essandje


Lead Vocals: Essendje
Back up Vocals: Etoo, Yonga and Engoto
Percussion: Chris Berry

20) Brothers 5 (Wagogo) - It is believed by many that Pygmy music is the oldest in Africa and that much of African music today has stemmed from it. There is a 5
note pentatonic scale that the Bayaka mimic that is created by some of the birds living in their forests.

Lead Vocals: Mawa


Backing Vocals: Bomenge

21) Woodpecker - In this piece, there are three musical motifs. The first two are melodic and support the text, "It is Mbombokwe, it is Mbombokwe, he is picking
the caterpillars out of the bamboo canes!" The third, rhythmic and syncopated, supports the exclamations, "he he he." The participation of the choir is restricted to
a brief answer at the end of each motif.

From Africa: The Ba-Benzele Pygmies, Anthology of World Music, Rounder Records.

22) Geedal -The geedal is a generic central African instrument. It has a more extroverted sound than the harp-zither . The rhythms played on the geedal are fun,
danceable and are often influenced by Bantu music. To hear women's voices with the mens geedal is rare.

Composed by: Chris Berry and Francois Makoute


Vocals: Yete, Mawa, Eluka
Harp Player: Francois
Percussion: Chris Berry and Yandoumbe Drum Ensemble

23) Bicycle - Another geedal song played by one of the stars of the film, Mbanda. This is also unorthodoxly paired with a west african drum groove.

Composed by: Chris Berry and Francois


Singers: Yandoumbe Mens Choral Singers

24) Lari's Song (End Theme) - Written in the classic style of taking traditional themes and transposing them for western instruments.

Drums: Aaron Johnston


Guitar: Avi Miller
Sax: Peter Apfelbaum
Bass and Producer: Chris Berry
Co-Producer: Arron Johnston

25) Oka! Gano - Chris Berry recorded this piece some months after the film had left; the older men, including the gifted gano singer Angende, are telling stories
about their roles in the movie.

Lead Singer: Essandje


Singers: Angende, Mapumba, Mbanda, Tete
Back up Vocals: Yunga & Bomenge
Producer: Chris Berry

26) Ibis and Elephant - recorded in Dzanga Bai.

Soundscape field recordings and eco-acoustic composition by David Monacchi

All Music Written and composed by Chris Berry and the Bayaka of Yandoumbe unless otherwise noted*.

Executive Producer: Lavinia Currier


Producers: Chris Berry, Jamie Bruce and Lavinia Currier
Co-Producers: Paul Winter and Craig Kohland

Lavinia's special thanks To the Bayaka of Yandoumbe for sharing their music with us, and to Louis Sarno for introducing us to the Bayaka.To Michael Mc Cleary
for putting up with me and without me, and for all his good ideas. To Paul and Chez Winter for opening their house and studio so that we could make this album.
Chris Berry would also like to thank all of the above mentioned along with Jill Hurne and his two daughters; Waniso and Sekai, for all of their support during this
project.

Final album Mixing and Mastering: Amani Friend


Additional engineering support: Hoku Aki, Liberty Ellman, Aaron Johnston, Tommy Skarupa and Tira Neal

Chris Berry's publishing: BMI

Film website: www.okamovie.com

Copyright and Performance - 2011 Oka Productions, LLC/ all rights reserved

BACK PANEL:
This album celebrates the musical genius of the Bayaka Pymies of the Central African rainforest. It includes traditional Bayaka music, soundtrack pieces from the
film, and entirely new creations which are the result of the musical collaboration in the forest between the Bayaka and Chris Berry, the film's composer and a
musician of Africa music. Bayaka voices have been "sampled" before, but never before have the Bayaka been co-composers of crossover music, and they took to
it with great enthusiasm, old and young, offering songs they had dreamed in the forest, putting on headphones for the first time and laying down tracks…. music
by CHRIS BERRY AND THE BAYAKA OF YANDOUMBE

01 Women's Voices 0:52


02 Yetoo's Dream 2:21
03 Mboyo Flute 0:51
04 Yonga 3:21
05 Waterdrum 0:50
06 Bottlefunk Girls 3:47
07 Mua Solo 2:16
08 Honeybee 1:20
09 Congo Beat 3:42
10 Monkeys Eating Fruits 0:46
11 Tree Drum and Gano 2:04
12 Bokete 1:10
13 Walk In 3:33
14 Esuma (Wild Yam) 2:32
15 Song for Thinking 3:04
16 Elanda 1:10
17 Molimo 1:13
18 Elephant Gentle Laments 0:28
19 Mua Mix 3:42
20 Brothers 5 (Wagogo) 3:11
21 Woodpecker 2:23
22 Geedal 2:27
23 Bicycle 0:32
24 Lari's Song (End Theme) 2:53
25 Oka! Gano 1:05
26 Ibis and Elephant 0:49

Total Running Time 52:12

Copyright and Performance - 2011 Oka Productions, LLC. all rights reserved.

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