African music instrument donation helps UGA students learn music, culture, history

Jean Kidula's students don't just learn about the music of Africa and other continents when they take her classes in the University of Georgia's Hugh Hodgson School of Music.

They usually also wind up learning to play one or more of a multitude of musical instruments that originated in other parts of the world, especially if they're delving into African music.

Kidula, a native of Kenya, has her own collection of musical instruments.

But the collection got quite a boost earlier this year when one of her former professors gave her more than 70 African musical instruments the professor had collected in trips to the continent.

Kidula collected the instruments this December when she traveled to Goshen to visit Goshen College emeritus music professor Mary Oyer.

"I probably would call her my American mom," Kidula says.

Oyer, now in her 90s, taught music at Goshen College for more than four decades before retiring in 1987, published two editions of "The Mennonite Hymnal" and many other songbooks during that time.

She also traveled widely in Africa, recording indigenous music and collecting examples of the instruments the musicians used in her recordings.

Oyer also happened to be teaching at the University of Nairobi during Kidula's senior year there. Kidula took Oyer's introduction to Western music course.

However, Oyer didn't want her students just to study the music. She believes music must be understood within its cultural and physical context, so her students studied not only musical structures and compositions, but the political structures; the visual arts and drama of the times associated with the great works of Bach and others.

That course was the beginning of a lifelong friendship, and set Kidula on a career path. Oyer invited Kidula to come to the United States to further her studies, and after a year at Goshen College, she went on to earn a master's degree in music from East Carolina University and a doctorate from the University of California.

They have stayed in touch no matter where their travels took them.

"Regardless of where I was, she found me, or I found her," Kidula said.

Kidula has taught at UGA since 1998, the same year she received her doctorate.

The courses she teaches include an introductory course in world music and another in African music. She also teaches the school's African Music and Dance Ensemble.

Oyer's donation of nearly 80 musical instruments allowed Kidula to add a new wrinkle to her teaching last spring semester.

"I had the students choose an instrument and research it," she said.

They all learn to play one of a family of instruments called lamellophone - in its Westernized version called a kalimba.

But they also had a wide variety of others to choose from, including talking drums, lyres, zithers, fiddles, bells and mouth bows.

"They will have a little more understanding of the things they sample on YouTube," she said.

They also learn about how music and musical instruments migrated throughout the world, such as the banjo - initially an African instrument that became a standard part of American country and bluegrass music.

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