Carnegie Hall

The mbira is a family of instruments that holds a special and sacred place in the cultures of Zimbabwe. The instruments are made from strips of metal mounted on a gwariva (a wooden board) and placed within a deze (a resonator). They are held in the hands and played with the thumbs and forefingers. According to a Zimbabwean legend, Marimba—the goddess of song—created the mbira from her tears during a war between her son and Nangai, a god who resided on Mount Kilimanjaro. The sound of the mbira was said to stop all the warriors in their tracks and led them to weep. It is this legend that sets the mbira apart as an instrument used, at times, for healing. Mbira music is built upon complex contrapuntal lines that are played on the instrument and layered with a vocal melody and polyrhythmic percussion primarily performed with hosho (shakers) and kuombera (clapping).

Dr. Tanyaradzwa learned mbira music as a young child from her family, but she resisted playing the instrument herself initially. Instead, she began her musical training in the Western classical tradition, starting with the piano at age eight, adding cello at 12, and always singing. It wasn’t until she was a teenager that she embraced the tradition of her ancestors, began studying the mbira, and truly came to love it. From that point on, she has continued to weave together these two musical strands, as a performer, composer, and scholar. In addition to performing on mbira and piano and as a singer, she composes pieces for classical chamber groups that are learned by ear rather than notated, combining the aural traditions of her ancestors with the opportunities offered by new technology. Dr. Tanyaradzwa’s scholarship focuses on celebrating Zimbabwe classical music.