Isoko Performing Arts: Music in Folktales as Paradigm

MUSIC IN ISOKO FOLKTALES OF NIGERIA is a compendium of the music in the culture of Isoko people as used in their folktales in Nigeria. The folktales are transcribed from Isoko language into English language for better understanding while some words that are onomatopoeic are left in order to maintain their linguistic potency. The folktales’ songs are notated and analyzed contextually. The musical instruments in Isoko culture are also described in their classifications and usage. An upgrade from pentatonic scale to a chromatic scale with a constructive instruction on the Isoko people’s xylophone (ekpokro-ile) which is getting extinct is made. The playing technique of the improved ekpokro-ile is pedagogically written in this book. It is hoped that the folktales and musical themes in this book would attract the attention of composers, playwrights and artistic directors which could form a basis for their compositions and performances. African music technologists should be challenged to intensify their efforts at the standardization of the numerous African musical instruments using our theoretical model as paradigm.