Coelacanth and other Comoros Off The Beaten Path Tips

The islands possess a variety of animal life with several species unique to the Comoros or rarely found elsewhere. The famous Coelacanth, a fish once thought to be extinct for millions of years, is found very much alive in Comorian waters. Livingstone's flying fox , a giant fruit bat with a wing span over four feet, is found nowhere else in the world. Several varieties of insects and over a dozen species of birds are unique to the islands. Many of these animals are now being threatened with extinction. There is an abundance of life in the sea around the islands and one can see everything from giant whales to tiny shrimp.

Leave a Comment

Located at the northern end of the Mozambique channel, and at the eastern edge of the Bantu linguistic area, the Comoros are at a unique cultural and musical crossroads. Involved in the western Indian Ocean trade for over a thousand years, the islands have absorbed cultural and musical influences from East Africa, the Middle East, Madagascar, and southern India. As a result there is a remarkably wide range of musical styles in the Comoros: solo and choral, through composed and stanzaic, improvised and rehearsed, accompanied and acapella.

Contemporary Artists in the Islands and in Europe have been utilizing traditional sounds and themes and putting them in a modern idiom to produce some very interesting music.

Traditional instruments include gongs, drums, tambourines, rattles, oboes, zithers, and five-stringed lutes. The musical example below is a zither-and-rattle selection typical of social events such as womens' wedding dances. It is performed by Shirontro, a well-known singer and instrumentalist from Nzwani.

Leave a Comment