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Ape Trust’s Bonobos show their musical flair

Rocker Peter Gabriel says two of the ape trust’s bonobos have shown a musical flair.

By PERRY BEEMAN
REGISTER STAFF WRITER
April 26, 2005

It made perfect sense for musician Peter Gabriel, a big fan of experimental and world music, to jam with two bonobos at an Atlanta ape-language research center several years ago.

Those two bonobos, Panbanisha and Kanzi, are among eight moving to the Great Ape Trust of Iowa in Des Moines. On Monday, Panbanisha, 19, and her sons, Nyota, 7, and Nathan, 4, arrived in Des Moines after a 20-hour van ride from Georgia.

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Gabriel said in a telephone interview last week that he has no doubt the bonobos have a sense of music and composition. He hopes to visit them in Des Moines to continue pursuing his curiosity about ape-language research.

"In my mind, there is no question that they responded with great musicality and responded musically," said Gabriel, a co-founder of the rock group Genesis. "When I play the tape to other musicians, they are just amazed."

In a video that has not been made public because of copyright issues, Gabriel and his band interacted musically with the bonobos; each ape got a turn to play a keyboard along with music Gabriel was playing from an adjoining room.

A Register reporter viewed the video last week. Panbanisha appeared to carefully pick notes one at a time with both index fingers. Kanzi seemed more interested in rhythm. Both kept time well.

"I was always interested in the reports of apes learning our language," said Gabriel, who called bonobo researcher Savage-Rumbaugh and asked to visit her project at Georgia State. "She said, ‘Come on down!’ " said Gabriel, who lives in England.

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Gray’s analysis showed that Panbanisha picked as her first note the root of the chord Gabriel was playing, and followed it with the third, played on the index finger of her other hand. Later, she improvised a section that embedded a passage Gabriel had played earlier in the jam. "At times we were together, and at other times, maybe not as well," Gabriel said.

The apes had a keyboard for a couple of weeks before Gabriel came, and had not been taught to play. At Gabriel’s request, Savage-Rumbaugh told the apes only that they should use one finger at a time and play the white keys.

Gabriel said he also hopes to work with parrots and dolphins, two other species that have shown strong communication abilities.

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