The women of theBaka ethnic group, who live in the rainforests of the Central African Republic, sing polyphonic chants while gathering mushrooms. This interwoven melody, fittingly titled Women Gathering Mushrooms, sounds like this:
As Merlin Sheldrake recounts in his fascinating book Entangled Life:
“As they walk collecting mushrooms, their steps trace the underground shape of the mycelial network, and the women sing amidst the sounds of the forest animals. Each woman sings a different melody; each voice tells a distinct musical story. Many melodies intertwine while still remaining many. The voices flow with others, intertwining and accompanying one another.”
Thousands of hours of Baka’s chants
Women Gathering Mushrooms is one of the thousands of recordings compiled by ethnographer and musicologist Louis Sarno during the 1980s. Over the three decades that Sarno—a native of New Jersey (USA)—lived among the Baka in the heart of Africa, he recorded more than 1,600 hours of these magical polyphonic chants. Some of them can be heard here or here.
Sarno’s personal story is, at the very least, as fascinating as Baka women’s musical culture. This Newsweek article paints an accurate portrait of the so-called “white pygmy.”
Sheldrake continues in Entangled Life:
“Women Gathering Mushrooms is an example of musical polyphony. Polyphony consists of singing by combining multiple voices, or telling more than one story simultaneously. Unlike the harmonies of a ballad quartet, the women’s voices never fuse into a single unified whole. No voice surrenders its individual identity. If the recording were played to ten people and they were asked to reproduce the song, each one would sing something different”.
Another example of this mesmerizing fungal polyphony:
“Mycelium is polyphony in bodily form. Each woman’s voice is like a hyphal tip, exploring a soundscape on its own. Although each is free to wander, their wanderings cannot be seen as separate from the others. No one leads the song. There is no guiding melody. There is no central planning. And yet, a form emerges,” Sheldrake concludes.
The Baka People and Their Relationship with the Forest
The Baka ethnic group consists of about 30,000 people living in the rainforests of the Central African Republic and Cameroon—one of the most remote and inaccessible areas in the heart of Africa. Their knowledge of and adaptation to the tropical forest far exceed those of any other ethnic group in the region. Until recently, other tribes believed (and some still do) that the Baka could transform into animals through rituals and potions, as described in this Last Places article.
The Baka are hunter-gatherers. Each group’s survival depends on hunting, fishing, and gathering. The forest provides an abundance of animals, fish, honey, mushrooms, fruits, and nuts. Honey is especially valued by the Baka people. Nearly 30% of their vocabulary consists of words used to designate plants. Their incredible skills and endurance in the forest make them successful hunters. The Baka know every plant and recognize every animal track, no matter how small.