Off and on since 2002, from Global Voice's beginnings, we began funding Louis Sarno's work with the BaAka, and for the last six years more seriously after his death. Sarno had been originally inspired by The Forest People of Colin Turnbull who worked among the Mbuti Pygmies in the Ituri forest of northeastern Zaire. Not knowing Sarno's love of their music would lead to building a life amongst them, becoming their village scribe, as well as the recorder of their music.
Due to the cooperation of Radio France, Pitt Rivers Museum and GVF, Sarno's recordings of over thirty-five years are being broadcasted daily on Radio Ndjoku. Most recently, in Amsterdam, a box of cassettes recorded in his first years with them was discovered--these hold the memories of their forest rituals.
“Foragers of the rainforest of Central Africa, like the Amerindians of the Amazon area, are, in a sense, keepers of the planet’s oxygen system. Attuned to the vagaries of ecology as few other people are. African rainforest foragers present us with a most important way of life. Louis Sarno was privileged to witness the visitation of the mokoondi (the forest spirits) with their incredible phosphorescent body art, their equally striking cries and shouts.”
