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Xalam, also spelled khalam, is the Wolof name for a traditional stringed musical instrument from West Africa. The xalam is thought to have originated from modern-day Mali, but some believe that, in antiquity, the instrument may have originated from ancient Egypt. Many believe that it is an ancestor to the American banjo. Wolof is a language spoken in Senegal, the Gambia, and Mauritania, and it is the native language of the ethnic group of the Wolof people. ...
A musical instrument is a device that has been constructed or modified with the purpose of making music. ...
Western Africa (UN subregion) Maghreb West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of the African continent. ...
The xalam is commonly played in Mali, Gambia, Senegal, Niger, Northern Nigeria, Northern Ghana, Burkina Faso and Western Sahara; it is also known in other languages as bappe, diassare, hoddu (Pulaar), koliko (Frafra), komsa, kontigi (Hausa), koni, konting (Mandinka), molo (Songhay/Zarma), ndere, ngoni (Bambara), and tidinit (Hassaniyya Arabic). Fulani women in the East Province of Cameroon The Fulani is an ethnic group of people spread over many countries in West Africa, from Mauritania in the northwest to Cameroon in the east. ...
Frafra is a colonialist term given to a subset of Gurunsi peoples living in northern Ghana and their language. ...
The Hausa are a people chiefly located in northern Nigeria and southeastern Niger. ...
The Mandinka are a Mande people of West Africa, all descendent physically or culturally from the ancient Mali Empire which controlled the trans-Saharic trade from the Middle East to West Africa. ...
The Songhai are an ethnic group living in western Africa. ...
Zarma is a major Songhay language of Niger with over 2 million speakers. ...
The Bambara (sometimes Banmana) are a group of people living in west Africa, primarily in Mali but also in Guinea, Burkina Faso and Senegal. ...
Hassaniya is a dialect of Arabic derived from the Arabic spoken by the Beni Hassan tribe, who extended their authority over most of the Mauritanian Sahara between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries. ...
Someone who plays the xalam is called a xalamkat (a word composed of the verbal form of xalam, meaning "to play the xalam," and the agentive suffix -kat, thus meaning "one who xalams").
Construction and tuning The xalam, in its standard form, is a simple lute with one to five strings. The wooden body (soundbox) of the instrument is oval-shaped and covered with the hide of cattle. The strings of the xalam are typically made of two or three tightly wound strands of low-gauge nylon fishing line; these strings are fixed to the instrument's wooden neck by long and narrow leather strips and to its wooden bridge by cotton strings. By moving these strips, the instrument's tune can be adjusted. The xalam usually has two main melody strings that are fingered by the left hand (like the strings of a guitar or banjo) and two to three supplementary strings of fixed pitch. Most xalam players construct their own xalams, although they usually call on woodworkers (lawbe) to carve the body, neck, and bridge for them. The lute is a plucked string instrument with a fretted neck and a deep round back. ...
Binomial name Bos taurus Linnaeus, 1758 Cattle (called cows in vernacular usage, kine archaic, or kye as the Scots plural of cou) are domesticated ungulates, a member of the subfamily Bovinae of the family Bovidae. ...
Nylon represents a family of synthetic polymers, a thermoplastic material, invented in 1935 by Wallace Carothers at DuPont. ...
Modern leather-working tools Leather is a material created through the tanning of hides, pelts and skins of animals, primarily cows. ...
In most Wolof-speaking parts of Senegal, the xalam has three principal tunings, all of which involve tuning the two main strings a perfect fourth apart. In the first tuning (ci suuf or low), the main strings are tuned 1 and 4 ('1 being the fundamental of a major scale), with three supplementary strings being tuned an octave higher to 1', 2', and 3'. The second tuning (ci kow or high) uses the same string intervals but the fundamental is placed a minor second above the higher melody string, meaning that the open main strings now play the role of 3 and 6, with the supplementary strings acting as 3' and 4#, the highest supplementary string usually being ignored. In the third tuning (ardin), the fundamental is a minor third above the lowest main string and the main strings are tuned 6 and 2, with supplementary strings tuned to 5 and 1'. The third supplementary string is either ignored or is tuned to 6 or 2'. If playing in an ensemble, the ardin xalam's main strings are tuned a minor third below the cu suuf xalam, and the ci kow xalam is tuned a major third above the ci suuf xalam to ensure that the fundamentals of each xalam coincide. (Thus, if the ci suuf xalam's lowest note were C, the ardin s lowest note would be a low A and the ci kow xalam's lowest note would be E.)
Players In most areas the xalam is played by male griots, or praise singers who are born into the profession. It most often acts as a solo or duo instrument to accompany praise songs and historical recitations, and in some areas it may form part of a larger group including kora, drums, and calebashes. It is traditionally heard at weddings, infant naming ceremonies, and weddings, and (always with amplification) is now a common member of folklore ensembles, popular mbalax groups, and ndaga variety shows. Griots, pronounced greeohs, are wordsmiths of West Africa who use poetry, proverbs, and rhythm to teach villagers about their history. ...
Mbalax is a genre of popular music developed in Senegal and Gambia. ...
Important past and present Senegalese xalam masters include Sàmba Jabare Sàmb, Ama Njaay Sàmb, Abdulaay Naar Sàmb (all from the Jolof), Abdulaay Soose (from the Saalum), and Bokunta Njaay (from the Bawol). The best known Malian ngoni player is Banzumana Sisoko.
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