Musicale of primitive instruments

Willard Rhodes, Columbia University anthropologist specializing in musicology, discusses numerous musical instruments from the AMNH collection. Dancers appear on a large keyboard set to illustrate Rhodes's concepts concerning primitive music. A group of musicians give a music performance with a score especially created for this program by Samuel Barber, noted composer and Pulitzer Prize winner, using nose flutes, water gongs, a Congo piano, and other exotic and aboriginal musical instruments from the museum's collection. Most of the instruments are from China, Java, Bali, Africa, and the various Melanesian islands, although some Western instruments are added for the performance. The John Butler dancers perform to the music.