Credited to Zimbabwe. Lamellophones are found across Africa and were not invented in one place. Wood or bamboo-tined forms appeared on the west coast of Africa about 3,000 years ago, and metal-tined forms appeared in the Zambezi River valley, which Zimbabwe shares with neighboring countries, around 1,300 years ago. The 2020 UNESCO listing is shared between Malawi and Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe's claim is to the Shona mbira specifically.
How it began
Mbira are a family of instruments traditional to the Shona people of Zimbabwe, and the word mbira comes from Shona. Plucked instruments of this kind appear to have been invented twice in Africa: with wood or bamboo tines on the west coast about 3,000 years ago, and with metal tines in the Zambezi River valley around 1,300 years ago. The metal-tined instruments traveled across the continent and became popular among the Shona and other groups in Zimbabwe and Mozambique.
How it works
The Shona mbira has 22 to 28 metal keys mounted on a hardwood soundboard, the gwariva, made from the mubvamaropa tree. It is often wedged with a small stick inside a large calabash resonator, the deze, to amplify it. Metal beads, bottle tops or shells fixed to the board and resonator add a buzz that players consider an essential part of the sound. Each instrument has a range of 3 to 3.5 octaves. Many tunings are used, and each group of villages typically has its own.
How it spread
The ethnomusicologist Hugh Tracey began commercial production and export of the kalimba, modeled on the mbira nyunga nyunga, in the late 1950s, which popularized similar instruments outside Africa. In the 1960s and 1970s musicians such as Thomas Mapfumo and Maurice White of Earth, Wind and Fire brought mbira to the stage alongside electric instruments. Dumisani Maraire and Ephat Mujuru taught Zimbabwean instruments in the United States.
Where it stands today
The mbira is played at religious ceremonies, weddings and other social gatherings, often with the hosho rattle. Because of recurrent droughts, the calabash resonator is now often replaced by a fiberglass one molded on a calabash. In 2020 the art of crafting and playing mbira and sansi in Malawi and Zimbabwe was added to the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
