Inca Music

The inca music melodies had only 5 tones (do,re,fa,sol,la) and it was enough to create four types of music; The first was the Haylli (War melodies), perform in the battle field right before the fight to increase the bravery of the warriors, the war melodies were perform as well on the celebration of the victories, most of this songs were created to inspire the warriors, with tells of brave acts of great warriors from the past.

The second type of inca music is the Ayarachi (Funeral melodies), this music was perform in burial ceremonies and during the grieving days, it was compose of tells about the body going to the Pachamama (Mother earth), the tells talk about of the body going back to his mother, where it belongs feating plants and animals, other songs were about the trip of the spirit, that will go to see the inca god Wiracocha for the final judgment.

The third type of inca music is the Harawi (Religious melodies), they were special prepare to grow the spirituality of the people during the religious ceremonies, the songs talk about the infinite power of the inca god Wiracocha, the power of the smaller divinities like the lighting, the moon and others; As well few songs were tells of the inca mythology, about the incas origins and prophesies of the return of the gods.

The fourth and final type of inca music is the Trilla-takiy (Agriculture labor melodies), the songs talk about love, anecdotes, funny things that happened among the community and opinions of a large variety of subjects, like marriage, women, man, relationships, etc; They were sing during the agriculture work day, transforming the work day into an entertainment reunion.

The musical instruments were of two kinds: The first was the percussion instruments, with a big drum call Wankar and a smaller drum call Tinya, the last one was only play by inca women; They were made of leather of llama or alpaca, other drums use for ceremonies or special occasions were made of leather of cougars or jaguars, rarely some Tinyas drums were made with human skin.

The second kind of instruments are: The wind instruments, like the Quena (Inca flute), it was made of clay, silver, human bones and more commonly of reeds, it has a tubular shape of 25cm of length, with five or six holes on the top and one hole at the bottom; Recently the quena has been named, Peruvian musical culture heritage; Another kind of inca flute is the Picullo, similar to the quena but with a small piece of wood adapted to make it easy to play, it sound is penetrating and less sweet than the quena.

Another important inca music wind instrument is the Antara, it is a set of tubes of equal diameter but with different length, this tubes are open in one end and close in the other, all this tubes are tight in line, aligned with the open holes of the tubes one next to each other; They were made of reeds, clay, soft stones, gold, silver, wood, feathers of birds such as the pelican and condor, bones of llama, vicuña, condor and human bones.

The inca music as well had horns and trumpets; Definitely the most popular horn was the Huayllaquepa (known as Pututu, it is a big sea shell), the name of Pututu was given by the spaniards, it was use in ceremonies and religious purposes, it was use as well by the chasquis (kind of runner mail man), the chasqui play his Pututu one or two kilometers before his arrival to the Tambo (rest house), so the next chasqui get the advice to get ready to start to run, with no waste of time.

The inca music still alive today, because some Peruvian musicians limit their instruments to have the five tones that the incas use before; The legacy of the inca culture, has inspire most of the songs of the andes musical groups and the sound of their music, it is just like it was centuries ago; The introduction of new musical instruments into the inca culture, had give birth to more than 1300 different Peruvian musical genres like the Marinera, Huayno, Vals criollo, Sikuri, Festejo, just to mention a few.

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