Arriving in Madagascar earlier this year, in September, I was greeted by the sound of the Hira gasy. 21 kilometres north of the capital, Tana, in Ambohimanga ("the blue hill"), Ramilison Fenoarivo's troupe were indulging in their favourite pastime, haranguing the public with a series of abstruse speeches, interspersed with music, songs and acrobatic dance. In honour of the arrival of the Vazaha (i.e., us, the whites), one of the dancers even began contorting himself into a number of spread-eagled postures to mime the landing of a Boeing airbus.

It's to signal your presence amongst us,", explained Aurore, an elderly woman standing beside me in the audience. "There are many more layers of meaning in this show than you'd imagine, you know. For a start, part of the songs and dances are a way of the performers telling their friends and dead relatives that they're about to leave for Europe." Another touching part of the ceremony involved several dancers pocketing a piece of earth in front of Rova, the palace that once belonged to Andrianampoinimerina (the 18th-century king responsible for the reunification of the High Plateaux).

After our visit to Ambohimanga we returned to Tana where we spent the next eight days wending our way through crowds of poorly-dressed locals, beggars and young women selling shirts and tablecloths embroidered with hump-backed oxen. Dirty, snotty-nosed children trailed along behind, barefoot, looking thin and under-nourished, while wailing babies hung off the backs of pre-pubescent mothers. It's impossible not to dart your eyes round the crowd, looking for the irresponsible fathers. And it's impossible, it seems, to be a musician in Madagascar without having some form of social conscience.

"The problem in this country is poverty," says Benny, one of the lead singers with the group Feo Gasy. "But poverty isn't endemic to Madagascar, it's the result of bad management, of complete incompetence when it comes to sharing out the land. This island's actually one and a half times the size of France. There are only 14 million people living here and we have a policy of family planning. The problems stem from the fact that the land distribution policy isn't up to scratch. Our role as musicians is to make people aware of that and encourage some sort of debate about it."

On the Red Island (as Madagascar is frequently known), musicians and those involved in the arts in general are a force to be reckoned with – and woe betide the government authority that ignores them! In fact, there is not a group on the island, no matter how upbeat and lightweight its music, that does not raise the issue of the nation's suffering at some point in their songs. "The south of the island's an entire century behind other regions," complains Jean Gabin Fanovona, leader of the group Vaovy (named after a type of Madagascan wood). "Drinking water's an issue in a lot of my songs because it's a fundamental problem in the South. Water's so expensive that kids don't get to have a shower every day. They can't even wash their face before they go to school!"

The taciturn ambassador of the Antandroys ("the thorn people", who make their living raising herds of zebu oxen) expresses himself with a certain weariness, a weariness that inevitably creeps into the voice of those who've been repeating the same thing for too long. "In my younger days I was a great rock and R'n'B singer, like Otis Redding," he says, "I used to perform at local dances with a band playing electric instruments. But then one day I turned round and realised that traditional Madagascan music was about to die out completely and I decided to do something to preserve our musical heritage. I got back into playing traditional music in my career around 1993." However, like his neighbour, the Madagascan guitar star D'Gary, Jean Gabin finds himself touring more frequently abroad than he does in his homeland. "The average Madagascan isn't too interested in traditional music right now," he laments, "People prefer to listen to 'heavy' stuff, like zouk, African soukouss and rap."

When it comes to traditional music, the south of Madagascar echoes to the sound of vocal polyphony while regions in the north and the High Plateaux are home to a more virile, pulsating rhythm known as salegy. Played in rapid 6/8 time, salegy induces wild, sweat-drenched dancing amongst the population in the north. At a recent performance by Eusèbe Jaojoby, better known as the king of salegy, at Le Glacier Café in Tana, one man stumbled off the dance floor shouting, "Your music's amazing, Eusèbe. You get us to move the way we'd like to in bed, but we do it standing up dancing instead!" In reply, Eusèbe simply burst out laughing and turned to the rest of the Jaojoby family. (Music is a family affair with the Jaojobys, Eusèbe's sons are all musicians and his wife and daughters add extra animation to his show, singing and dancing).

Salegy is not just renowned for its erotically-charged dance rhythms, however. Since the 16th century this traditional style of music has also been closely associated with rituals celebrating life and death. "Salegy is a means of bringing our ancestors back to life," says Jaojoby, a former radio journalist turned singer, "When the music puts the dancers into a trance the ghosts of our ancestors come and take over their bodies and they party together. That's nothing out of the ordinary for us. In the Sakalava ("people of the long valleys") tribe we communicate with the dead on a daily basis."

Trumba is another genre of Madagascan music used to invoke the dead. Lego, a spirited young musician from the northern outback, is a popular trumba performer and one well-versed in the sacred rhythms performed as a possession ritual. Lego, a half-brother of the Madagascan star, Rossy (who recently released his album Island Of Ghosts on Peter Gabriel's label Real World), had to fight long and hard to become a musician, though. The fact that he is a member of the Andrimisara, a tribe directly descended from the Sakalava kings, prevented him from getting involved in such a "lowly" profession as music. Fortunately for music fans, Lego's passion for trumba won out over tribal restrictions in the end.
Tsapika is another popular style of Madagascan music, which evolved at local peasant dances in the suburbs of Tuléar (a town in the south-west of the island). Tsapika is played loud, with a lot of feedback - not because of musical taste, but out of necessity! Electric guitars are plugged directly into loud speakers in the absence of amplifiers and musicians are forced to make their own hybrid instruments themselves. The wildly discordant sound of these "dust dances" (so-called because of the swirling white dust which accompanies open-air dancing), is captured on the Madagascan guitarist D'Gary's new album Akata Mesa (Green Grass).

But the undisputed king of the music scene in Tana is a man by the name of Rajery ("the gaze of others"). This dynamic 36-year-old has a finger in many pies, working as a musician, instrument-maker, therapist, social worker – and occasional driver for Vazahas who have lost their way! Rajery, the head of several local associations campaigning against child labour, is also actively engaged on passing on the tradition of the valiha (Madagascar's tubular harp). In fact, Rajery not only teaches kids in the neighbourhood how to play the instrument, but also gives regular performances himself in a psychiatric hospital treating young people with behavioural difficulties. "It's normal for us to cure people through music in Madagascar," he says, "After all, according to ancient Madagascan tradition music is part of our food and history and it's a well-known fact that it also has a powerful effect on the psyche."

Rajery lost his right hand at the age of 11 months, after suffering a serious bout of food poisoning from eating rotten meat, but he declares that "My handicap has given me strength in life. I remember when I was a teenager and I went off to play the valiha in a local Catholic parish, I got up on stage and everyone started making fun of me because of my stump. I was so upset I started shaking all over and I only had one thought in my mind – get out of there fast! But I stood my ground and played the valiha. And, it's thanks to that first audience who gave me such a hard time that I've found the courage to do what I want in life and see things through to the end, no matter how difficult the circumstances!"

The valiha has been a symbol of dignity in Rajery's own life and now he hopes that the instrument will also play a role in national life. "My dream is that things could be like they are in Brazil," Rajery says, "where samba, capoeira and football have become national symbols. I'd love it if the mere mention of the word valiha would automatically evoke Madagascar!"

Talking of national symbols, we got to meet the legendary Madagascan flautist and sodina star, Rakoto Frah a few days before the end of our visit. Lying on a hospital bed in Tana, surrounded by some friends, journalists and local TV cameras, Frah told us: "Sodina is my energy, my life force! Rakoto Frah died a few days after our visit but last weekend his musician friends, led by fellow Feo Gasy member Erick Manana, paid a final tribute to him at the "Musiques de Madagascar" festival held at the "Cité de la musique" in Paris.

Laurence Aloir
Translation: Julie Street

Recommended listening:
Rajery / Fanamby (Indigo / Label bleu)
Jaojoby / Aza arianao (Indigo / Label bleu)
Vaovy / Aba (Indigo / Label bleu)
Feo gasy / Ramano (Daqui / Harmonia Mundi)
D'Gary / Akata mesa(Indigo / Label bleu)
Fans of the valiha should check out any album by Rakotozafy.

MUSIQUES MALGACHES AT LA CITE DE LA MUSIQUE

Recommended reading: Madagascar, les chants d'une île, an interesting new book about Madagascan music written by Victor Randrianary (published by Les éditions Cité de la musique/ Actes Sud).