NAMEKAS: MUSIC IN LAKE CHAMBRI

53 minutes Colour 1979
Film-maker: Les McLaren

For the people who live on an island in Lake Chambri near the Sepik River in Papua New Guinea, everything has a spirit. These spirits are characterized by the music of the people and in their artwork. This film portrays the spirits of three villages through poetic photography and the music itself.

Namekas uses the music as a connective thread, weaving it through the society, a part of everyday and ritual life. The spirits of the society are divided into those of the sun or those of the moon. No accidents occur, rather earthly existence is a play directed by the spirits. These spirits are contacted through dreams and through music. Villagers must ask the god of the lake for permission to fish or to enter the lake for any purpose. The wind god, her shape seen in the movement of the trees, brings the white floods at the end of the dry season. The spirits of the lake are the domain of the moon while spirits of the bush are the domain of the sun. The music for these spirits forms a vital part of initiation, death ceremonies, and traditional warfare. The ritual and secular importance of the music allows unity between earth and spirit and embodies the balance between sun and moon.

Because of the power of music, villagers steal songs and magical flutes from other groups, and for control of these songs they go to war. In the film there are songs, translated in sub-titles, of greeting, of fertility, of initiation, of traditional warfare and of bereavement. Besides the singing, a variety of instruments make the music including bamboo jews harps, slit drum and panpipes. In one sequence, a man uses a living sage beetle for an instrument, making music on its vibrating wings.

For those interested in the music, the film provides high-quality sound recording of musical performances unobstructed by commentary. For all viewers, the film creates an enjoyable experience and through its moving use of picture and sound shows how in Lake Chambri, music links night to day, birth to death. The people shown are those described as Tchambuli by Margaret Mead (1963). Catalogue number (16mm): RA97 £18.

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D. Gewertz, 1982. `The Father who bore Me: The Role of the Tsambunwuro during Chambri Initiation Ceremonies'. In G.H. Herdt (ed.) Rituals of Manhood: Male Initiation in Papua New Guinea. University of California Press, Berkeley.

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