Gitara Gasy

Photo: Ian Anderson
Mandoliny (kabosy) & farara
(harmonica) player Torosoa,
Tuléar

There is no single, uniform Malagasy guitar style. Between the almost mainland African lead guitars of the electric salegy and watcha-watcha bands from the north, through courtly, classical highland plateau playing with echoes of 19th-century parlour music, slack key and ragtime, to the dauntingly dense flurries of the marovany-inclined players like D'Gary, Dozzy and Solomiral's Haja, there are major gulfs. It's a huge island - our drive south to Tulear took several long days to achieve, and that was starting from the central highlands, not the north. Not only are the regions hugely and breathtakingly different in climate and landscape, so are the cultures and roots musics of the many tribes.

And please don't believe the fanciful notion that Madagascar is entirely 'exotic', which some like to labour. To be sure, it's a long way from California, and there is indeed stuff that's deliciously other-planetary, but you have to remember that the country was a French colony for over 60 years. Long before that, under the Merina queens and kings and British influence in the 19th century, it already had one of the most advanced and educated civilisations in the African sphere (check Mervyn Brown's A History Of Madagascar, Tunnicliffe, for a rivetting account). Madagascar certainly has more than its share of unique traditions - like many cultures do if you care to look - but it has also had major musical input from outside. The guitar, for example...