Sound Travels: Ethnomusicology in the Pacific

During November, Honolulu is hosting two major gatherings of preeminent scholars in the field of ethnomusicology: The annual meeting of the Society of Ethnomusicology on November 16-19 in Waikiki, followed by The Study Group on the Musics of Oceania (SGMO) meeting at UH-Manoa, on November 19–21.

The SGMO, a subgroup of the International Council for Traditional Music, consists of researchers specifically devoted to work in the Pacific Islands and Australia. In honor of these two gatherings, throughout November Special Collections is displaying selected musical instruments from Hawaii (a puniu, or knee drum), greater Polynesia (poi balls from Aotearoa), Micronesia (a ngaok, or reed flute from Palau) and Melanesia (a kundu, or hour-glass drum, from Papua New Guinea), all of which have been provided for this exhibit by the university's Ethnomusicology Program. (Special thanks to professor Jane Moulin and graduate assistant Chad Pang for facilitating the loan of these rare and extremely valuable instruments.)

The Special Collections hours are at http://www2.hawaii.edu/~speccoll/specialinfo.html.

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