As part of our Christmas Concert on Sat 2 Dec, we are singing a suite of traditional songs from around the world.

Choral singing plays a major role in traditional Bantu music, in which interlocking contrapuntal lines and lilting voices combine to produce beautiful sound. Boys sing "Somagwaza" at their man- hood-initiation ceremony. As the young men are receiving instruction about the duties and responsibilities of adult citizenship, they live apart from the rest of the village. During this time, the teachers daub their students with ceremonial clay. When the training is over, the boys - now officially men - race down to the river to wash, singing "Somagwaza" as they go. This song's words, like those of many ceremonial chants, have lost their exact meanings, but their effectiveness remains. It is felt rather than understood.

The Tenors and Basses are ready......