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143Vocal Polyphony in AsiaAsia is by far the biggest and the most populous continent on our planet, with twothirds of the world’s entire population living there. The immense size and the number ofpeoples, languages, religions, and cultures make it nearly impossible to generalize aboutAsian musical cultures. The only factor that makes my task (reviewing vocal polyphonictraditions) easier is that, according to the available information, there are not so manypolyphonic cultures in Asia. But again, this is only “according to the availableinformation”. I am quite sure that there are more vocal polyphonic traditions in Asia thathave not reached mainstream western ethnomusicology. There are few good reasons forthis belief:(1) From the late medieval times when contact between the Europe and Asia(m ostly with China and India) became more consistent, the oppositionbetwee n “East and West” came into existence. This opposition, that stillhaunts the desire of humanity to come closer to each other, was expressed bymusicwriters very clearly: West is polyphonic and the East monophonic. It isclear today that some Asian peoples have vocal polyphonic traditions (like thepeoples of southern China, south and northeastern India, eastern Afghanistan,or Taiwan), and some European peoples have monophonic singing traditions(like almost the whole of France, Finland and Hungary), but stereotypes arestill alive. Even the Garland Encyclopedia of World Music, the bestethnomusicological encyclopedic publication, out of four special volumesdedicated to the different regions of Asian continent, two do not mention inthe extended index such a basic term as “harmony”, and one does not mentionthe term “polyphony”.(2) Despite the fact that the above-mentioned generalization is not always correct,it seems quite safe to say that vocal polyphony is not a mainstream element ofmusical culture of at least some Asian countries. This might be the mainreason that research of traditional forms of polyphony was (and still is) verymuch marginalized in local ethnomusicological studies;(3) Western scholars, specializing in traditional musical cultures of differentAsian countries, likewise mostly study the most important and representativeelements of the given culture (for example, raga in India, or gamelan inIndonesia).According to currently available information (as inferior as it is), many Asiantraditional musical cultures contain some elements of vocal polyphony (group singing inunison and octaves with heterophonic elements). In instrumental music different forms ofpolyphony are widespread (particularly heterophonic polyphony). More elaborate formsof vocal polyphony have been documented in a few regions of Asia: in the Persian Gulf,in some parts of India (among the tribal peoples of southern and Northeastern regions ofIndia), in the Northeastern part of Afghanistan (Nuristan), among southern Chineseethnic minorities, among Vietnam mountain minorities and a few other regions ofSoutheast Asia. Vocal forms of polyphony also exist among the aboriginal populations ofTaiwan, and among the enigmatic first population of the Japanese islands – Ainus. The