Call and Reply

Call and Reply All players form a circle. Then they all make a change of pace together with clapping, which sets the basic beat and is maintained all the time.

  Feet: left - right - right - left - right - right - etc.
  Clapping: * * *

Now one of them sings a bar in Gibberish-African, and everyone repeats the song in the next bar. Example:

• One: Umbwa Nugambe.
• All of them are called Umbwa Nugambe.
• One:"Salam bananu"
• All of them:"Salam bananu"
• One:"Ma O-Enu"
• All of them are Ma O-Enu.
• One:"Wasam banai"
• All of them were "Wasam banai"
• etc.

The exercise is very simple. But there's a good feeling. If that works out well, the role of the lead singer will go round and round. Everybody gets one shot at it.

Variant: 2 strokes

Two bars are always sung and repeated. Example:

• One:"Sasam oe, wanau madamba"
• All:"Sasam oe, wanau madamba"
• One:"Uruduku choo mi-gwom ba dah"
• All: "Uruduku choo mi-gwom ba dah"
• etc.

Variant: Any Gibberish

The prescription/association "African" is omitted, the players simply sing some kind of Gibberish, which doesn't have to orientate itself on any existing speech sound.

Further variant

The same with meaningful text. If possible, even rhymed. A default ("Song title") is helpful. Example: Title = "The cat in the fridge":

• One:"I've got a little pussycat..."
• All:"I got a little pussycat..."
• One:"She's pretty smart..."
• All:"She's pretty smart..."
• etc.

The repetition gives the next person a little time to think up the next line. This makes this warm-up game a bit easier than the game Continuous Story ("Die").