The Musical Bamboos of the Bolivian Andes

The interdisciplinary research on the Musical Bamboos of the Bolivian Andes includes topics and approaches related to various (sub)disciplines and fields of study such as ethnomusicology and organology, plant ecology and phenology, geobotany and phytogeography, sustainability studies and natural resource management, ecological economics and political ecology, as well as the anthropology of music and the environment. Inspired by ecomusicological and eco-organological studies on natural materials and musical instruments, the term "musical bamboos" expresses the use of native woody bamboos for wind instrument making in the Bolivian Andes.

During fieldwork for my PhD thesis (between 2015 and 2020), I accompanied my flute maker friends in their everyday flute-making activities and spent valuable moments in their workshops. Chewing coca leaves together, being surrounded by all kinds of musical bamboos, we discussed the dynamics in the Andean music culture of the Aymara highlands and the future of Walata Grande as a specialized flute-making center. We critically assessed the conditions for a sustainable future of highland flute-making practices and shared thoughts about the current challenges in obtaining, sourcing, and collecting musical bamboos.

Within these local bamboo categories of chhalla and tuquru, there are different types and variants with different characteristics. Highland flute makers use at least six different chhalla types, which are named after the recognized sourcing regions in the yungas cloud forest ecoregion. They furthermore divide between three distinct tuquru types (with some subdivisions), also growing in different parts of the Bolivian yungas. These types and variants of chhalla and tuquru bamboo differ in tube length and diameter, wall thickness, internode length, texture, and weight. Bamboo selection is based on aesthetic, acoustic, and morphological aspects, but it varies between flute makers and flute-making contexts.

While bamboo-made flutes are made and played on the Aymara highlands, native Andean woody bamboos are sourced in the tropical yungas cloud forests and Andean-Amazonian foothills. Sourcing sites and regions are distributed all along the range of chhalla and tuquru bamboos. The selection of central sourcing sites and regions is linked to the spatial distribution of bamboos. Other non-ecological factors are also important, such as those that facilitate access to bamboo populations (road infrastructure, human settlements, local contacts, etc).

These Andean woody bamboos are perennial plants, which means that they have life cycles longer than two years. Moreover, they are monocarpic plants that die after flowering. Andean woody bamboos such as chhalla and tuquru exhibit gregarious flowering and mast seeding, in which all individuals of the same cohort synchronize and simultaneously flower and set seeds. During my fieldwork, I linked my own field observations of the biological life cycle stages in 2018 with local flute maker and bamboo collector knowledge and reconstructed flowering events from herbarium specimens where available.

Analyzing the musical bamboos from such a phenological perspective helps to better understand the ecological implications for Aymara flute makers in terms of material availability. It shows how highland flute making — in addition to cultural frames of musical seasonality where specific musical instruments and genres were played according to distinct climatic and festive seasons — is ecologically framed by the phenology of musical bamboos. One can observe a clear trend of time-staggered flowering events of different musical bamboo species so that the mass mortality of one species is followed by a flowering event of another.

Both chhalla (Rhipidocladum) and tuquru (Aulonemia) bamboos lignify (harden) approximately half-way through their life cycles. The best gathering season is the dry season, when rains diminish and the starch content decreases (which means fewer insect borers in the culm). Over the rainy season, new culms grow and propagate from the clumping rhizome. If done correctly, I was told by bamboo collectors, clumps can be collected over several years until the bamboo finally decays.

The question of sustainability in flute making as it relates to the use of native woody bamboos is a complex issue. First, it depends on the ecological and environmental knowledges linked to musical bamboos. Knowledge transmission is key in this regard. Second, deforestation is induced by powerful national and international actors, while flute makers themselves have little power and autonomy in confronting this issue. Advocacy is needed to address these issues politically. If deforestation expands, it will surely increase supply-induced scarcities in the future, when climate change impacts on musical bamboos must also be considered. Third, overexploitation in recognized sourcing regions threatens the reproduction of musical bamboos. Reasons for this overexploitation are manifold and include the commodification of bamboos, middleman trading, the loss of sustainable gathering knowledge, tourist commerce, shifting bamboo demands, and extractivist collection practices.

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