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Abstract
The Iberian double-skinned square frame drum, known as adufe, or pandeiro quadrado (Portuguese) or pandero cuadrado (Spanish), is played almost exclusively by women, and is a legacy from the medieval period. While Spanish and Portuguese women play various round frame drums (as elsewhere in the Mediterranean), the focus of this article is on the square drum and its role in several aspects of secular, religious, and ritual life. The essay also explores the ways in which the songs women sing while playing the drum reflect their thoughts, concerns, and circumstances. Discussion also covers recent innovations, especially those involving men taking up the drum in performance contexts, and women's reactions to this.
Acknowledgements
My fieldwork has been supported by grants from the York University Office of Research Assistance 1996–8, the Canada Council for the Arts 1998–9 and 2001, and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada 1998–2001. In Portugal and Spain my fieldwork was often facilitated by friends and colleagues, and I would like to thank the following, in alphabetical order: José-Luis Adriano, Belarmino Afonso, Emilia Antunes, Xosé-Ramón Aparicio, Susana Asensio, Adriana Azinheiro and ‘Ilda’, Gianluca Baldó, Pilar Barrios, Antonio Bermejo, María-Alcina Cameira, Joaquim Veiga Canoas, César Castaño with Oscar and Luciano, Salwa Castelo-Branco, Angel Carril, Concha Casado Lobato, Antonio Cátana, José Ramón Cid, Valeriana Cid, Frances Cohen, Tamar Cohen Adams, Eugenia Collado, Mario Correia, Nuno Cristo, Alidia Cruchinho, Helena Elias da Costa, Maria da Costa Dias, Joaquin Díaz, Mercedes Amelia Diogo, María-José Domingos Raposo, El Caldero, Dario Feliciano Gonçalves, Juanjo Fernández, Rosa Fernández, Benita Fernández Martínez, Melisa Fernández Puentes, Amelia Fonseca, Joaquím Fonseca, José Manuel Fraile, Isabel García, María Antonieta García, Alzira Gaspar, Joëlle Ghazarian, Flores Gil, Inez Luna Gil, Prazeres Giraldes, Paz Gómez, Célia González, Eugenia González, María Pires Gordilha, Maruja Grande, Maria Gutiérrez, Marta Gutiérrez Rico Ana Henriques, Rosa Hernández, Luzia Henriqueta and Dosinda, Joaquina Labajo, Petra Labrador, María Asunción Lizarazu, Lisardo Lombardía, Maribel López, Bernarda Lourenço, Fernándo Malaquías, Carmen Marentes, Josep Martí, Begoña Martín, María-José Martínez, Judite Martinho, Cristina Martins, Belén Mato, Mayalde, Lidia de Mena, Manuel Mirandela, Mauricio Molina, Domingos Morais, Irene Morais, Leonor Narciso, Maria-José Osorio, Luis Payno, Helena ‘Leni’ Pérez, Rosa Paiva, Valentina Paiva, Eliseo Parra, Antonia Pascual, Antonio Pimenta de Castro, Ramom Pinheiro, Francisco Prada, Cesar Prata, Alicia Ramos, Isabel Ramos, Região de Turismo da Serra da Estrela, Vitor Reino, José Relvas, Marisa Retamar, ‘Mini’ Rivas, María-José Robalo, Manuel Rocha, Maria da Ascenção Rodrigues, Concha Rodríguez, Carlos Sáez, José Salgueiro, José-Alberto Sardinha, Julieta Silva, Dolors Sistac, José-Tomás Sousa and Acetre, Tecnosaga, Francesc Tomás, Fátima Torrado, Isabela Varão, Glen Velez, and Maria-Helena Ventura. Thanks also to anyone inadvertently omitted, and, most of all, thanks to all the village singers, drummers, and resource people, both those mentioned here and those whose names do not appear. I would also like to thank Veronica Doubleday for her patience, encouragement, and constructive comments and questions.
Notes
1. All translations from Portuguese and Spanish are my own.
2. In Arabic before another consonant the ‘l’ of the definite article ‘al’ usually takes on the sound of that consonant, so al-duff becomes adufe.
3. My research in Portugal and Spain was often facilitated by friends and colleagues, as mentioned in my Acknowledgements and in the following notes.
4. The adufe or a round frame drum was also sometimes used by Jewish women mourners, as far back as Talmudic times, i.e. by the fourth century C.E., and by Jewish women in medieval Spain, as well as by other women in the Mediterranean (Lorenzo Arribas 2003, 413, 536; also Seroussi Citation1998, section 5).
5. See Homo-Lechner and Rault 1999, 98; also Mauricio Molina's forthcoming monograph on the medieval Iberian frame drum. Several illustrations of medieval square drums may be viewed on the García de la Cuesta website: http://usuarios.arsystel.com/juanvicente/instrumentos/panderu/panderu.htm.
6. Thanks to José Luis Orjais and Ramom Pinheiro for this reference.
7. Thanks to Antonio CitationCátana, who provided this information (personal communication 2007).
8. Accounts of the drum's history and use, and women's role in playing it, singing traditional verses or verses composed by themselves or others, can be read in Dolors Sistac's 1997 monograph, in Palomar (Citation1990) and in Serra y Boldú (Citation1982 [1907]). Details of how the songs sung by the Mayorala functioned in daily life also appear in a little-known early twentieth-century novel (Eimeric Citation1924), whose existence Dolors CitationSistac pointed out to me.
9. This information comes from 2002 and 2003 fieldwork interviews with Inés Luna Gil (conducted with assistance from Miguel-Angel Gómez Nabarro) and with Rosalía Gómez and Flores Gil (conducted with assistance from Paz Gómez). Also see Pérez Citation1998 and López 2002, 32.
10. This assertion is based on his 1997 interview with a woman who remembered seeing the dance performed about a century earlier. See also CitationGutiérrez Rico (unpaged).
11. This fieldwork was facilitated by José-Tomás Sousa and carried out with María Gutiérrez.
12. This fieldwork was carried out with Juanjo Fernández, Paz Gómez and Juan-António Torres.
13. This fieldwork was carried out with María Asunción Lizarazu.
14. This lyric also appears in other areas of Spain and Portugal.
15. For history and illustrations of the square drum in the León/Asturias area, see recordings Lombardía Citation1997; Marentes and Criado Citation1987; and the 1992 ethnographic film by CitationCasado Lobato.
16. None of the Crypto-Jewish women I have interviewed there or in Beira Baixa over the years plays the square drum, but until recent decades, many lived in Monsanto and neighbouring towns, and there are also some, albeit vague, reports from Tras-os-Montes about their having played panderos (Afonso 1995, 74; Machado Citation1952, 48). Perhaps those people that I regularly interview, who have publicly reclaimed their Jewish identities, prefer to dissociate themselves from an instrument associated with Christian religious events (see CitationCohen 1999). An early twentieth-century observer in northern Morocco noted, without citing any specific source, that the ‘square deff’ or adufe was ‘taken from the Jews’ (García Barriuso Citation2001 [1941], 105).
17. This invention is also claimed by German drum builder David Faulwasser. I do not know of any village women outside the immediate area who have heard of the invention or any who use it (conversations and emails, 2006–07).
18. This folkloric festival tradition was recently inaugurated, and has been going for only a few years.
19. There are, however, still a very few older village women, including Maruja Grande, who play the square drum as it is played in Asturias and León, and in Portugal.
20. It should be noted that Amelia is in a somewhat sensitive position: her contact with Salgueiro was initiated by the prominent ethnomusicologist Salwa El-Shawan Castelo-Branco, and her husband, Joaquim Fonseca, who manages the Adufeiras of Monsanto, founded and directs the Monsanto radio station. For details of the Monsanto CD, see Recordings under CitationAdufeiras de Monsanto.