Madosini Motokali

Madosini is a South African Xhosa cultural treasure who plays instruments similar to those the first humans created thousands of years ago when they were first exploring the musical potential of the objects around them. In this clip you see her play the most astounding musical bow, the Mhube. This is a simple small bow, unarguably derived from the hunting bow of the early San peoples who used their bows for music as well and adopted by the Xhosa (who did not use the hunting bow). The mouth is the selective resonator of the partials/ harmonics produced by the string. Two sets of harmonics are produced by fingering the string producing a Lydian scale. An inward whistling produces additional glissando notes.