For the Kuba people, who live in the Democratic Republic of Congo, quantity and expense of decoration indicate status. The exterior of royal Kuba drum is covered with a dense layer of cowry shells the make it impossible for musicians to play the instrument without damaging the appearance. Its function has been eliminated, but that is okay because the king does not play his own drum anyway. Others play drums for him. Cameron adds that, in the Kuba culture, as in many others, drums sequence up in importance from the village drums that virtually anyone can play, to the drums that only warriors can play, all the way up to the king's drum that no one plays.
African harps can also vary significantly in their visual and aural purposes.
Rarer than drums, harps are still found throughout the continent and can range from the portable kora used by itinerant musicians in West Africa, to the lutes found in South Africa, to the human-shaped harps of the Azande and the Mangbetu peoples of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Illustrating the influence of American and European nineteenth and early twentieth century expeditions into the Mangbetu area, artists created beautiful figured harps because members of those expeditions expressed interest in how the human form appeared in sculpture. This exhibition traces the lineage of a distinct African-based heritage in North America and elsewhere from the seventeenth century to the present. They could bring their ideas, their religions, their songs. Now, African syncopation, percussion, instrumentation, and vocal patternings are deeply embedded in American music, including gospel, blues, jazz, rock and roll, and rap.