Avatar Music Culture

I have to admit that quite some time has passed since I went and saw Avatar at the theater. In preparing for this blog post I enlisted the help of the soundtrack to bring the memories of the unique imagery and soundscape that I so thoroughly enjoyed back to life. At first listen, it was rather easy to delineate what was specific to the film score and what was associated with the Na'vi culture. Then as the listening progressed, I noticed that some of the elements that were unique to each side were intertwined at some points. For the most part the songs that portray aspects of the film score contain sounds that can be heard in western culture. More specifically, the film score music component was intended to propel the movie forward and to drive human emotion through whatever scene that was displayed at the time. (Example: The song "War" used in the confrontation between Na'vi and humans). On the other hand, we have the Na'vi perspective where heavy use of membranophones were used. A lot of the sounds coming from this perspective were reminiscent of African tribal cultures and the chanting that took place provided an authentic indigenous experience which was the goal of the director.