music of Africa

The tradition & historical record

The continent of Africa and its music is vast and highly diverse, with different regions and nations maintaining distinct musical traditions. African music includes genres such as makwaya, highlife, mbube, township music, jùjú, fuji, jaiva, afrobeat, afrofusion, mbalax, Congolese rumba, soukous, ndombolo, makossa, kizomba, and taarab, among others. African music also uses a wide variety of instruments from across the continent. The music and dance traditions of the African diaspora, shaped to varying degrees by African musical traditions, include American genres such as Dixieland jazz, blues, and jazz, as well as Caribbean styles such as calypso (see kaiso), and soca. Latin American music genres including cumbia, salsa, son cubano, rumba, conga, bomba, samba, and zouk developed from the music of enslaved Africans and have, in turn, influenced contemporary African popular music. ¹

Like the music of Asia, India, and the Middle East, African music is highly rhythmic. Its complex rhythmic patterns often involve one rhythm played against another to create a polyrhythm. A common example is the three-against-two rhythm, comparable to a triplet played against straight notes. ¹

North Africa is the seat of ancient Egypt and Carthage, civilizations with strong ties to the ancient Near East and which influenced the ancient Greek and Roman cultures. Egypt later came under Persian, then Greek and Roman rule, while Carthage was later ruled by the Romans and the Vandals. The region was subsequently conquered by Arab forces, who incorporated the region into the Maghreb of Arab Africa (sky-blue and dark green region on map). Its music maintains close ties with Middle Eastern music and utilizes similar melodic modes (maqamat). North African music encompasses a wide range of styles, from the music of ancient Egypt to the Berber and Tuareg music of the desert nomads. For centuries, the region's art music has followed the conventions of Arabic and Andalusian classical music, while its popular contemporary genres include the Algerian raï. The music of Sudan and the Horn of Africa, including the music of Eritrea, Ethiopia, Djibouti and Somalia, may be grouped with those of North Africa. Somali music is typically pentatonic, using five pitches per octave in contrast to a heptatonic (seven note) scale such as the major scale. The music of the Ethiopian highlands is based on a modal system called qenet, which includes four main modes: tezeta, bati, ambassel, and anchihoy. Three additional modes are variations on the above: tezeta minor, bati major, and bati minor. Some songs take the name of their qenet, such as tizita, a song of reminiscence. ¹

Arthur Morris Jones (1889–1980), an ethnomusicological, observed that the shared rhythmic principles of Bantu African musical traditions form a single overarching system. Similarly, master drummer and scholar C. K. Ladzekpo affirms the "profound homogeneity" of Bantu African rhythmic principles. African traditional music is frequently functional in nature. Performances may be long and often involve the participation of the audience. There are specialized songs for work, childbirth, marriage, hunting, and political activities, as well as music intended to ward off evil spirits or honor benevolent spirits, the dead, and the ancestors. These forms are not typically performed outside their intended social contexts, and many are associated with specific dances. In some situations, professional musicians perform sacred, ceremonial, or courtly music at royal courts. Outside the greater Horn of Africa, as categorized above, the remainder of Sub-Saharan Africa can be divided into four musicological regions: ¹

Eastern region (light green on map): includes the music of Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, Malawi, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe, as well as the islands of Madagascar, the Seychelles, Mauritius, Somalia (which can also be considered to be part of East Africa), and Comoros. ¹

Besides vocalisation, which uses various techniques such as complex, hard melisma and yodeling, a wide variety of musical instruments are also used. African instruments include a wide range of drums, slit gongs, rattles, and double bells; harps and harp-like instruments such as the kora and the ngoni; fiddles; various xylophones and lamellophones such as the mbira; and wind instrument including flutes and trumpets. String instruments are also used, with lute-like instruments such as the oud and the ngoni serving as accompaniment in some regions. Sub-Saharan African musical instruments are grouped into five categories: membranophones, chordophones, aerophones, idiophones, and percussion. Membranophones include drums such as kettles, clay pots, and barrels. Chordophones are stringed instruments like harps and fiddles. Aerophones are wind instruments, including flutes and trumpets, similar to those found in American music. In Northern Nigeria, Niger, and Northern Cameroon, the algaita – a double reed instrument – is commonly played at festivals and seasonal celebrations. Idiophones are rattles and shakers, while percussion also includes body-produced sounds such as foot-stomping and hand-clapping. Many wooden instruments are carved with shapes or figures that represent ancestry, and some are decorated with feathers or beads. Drums used in African traditional music include talking drums, bougarabou and djembe in West Africa, water drums in Central and West Africa, and the different types of ngoma (or engoma) drums of Central and Southern Africa. Other percussion instruments include rattles and shakers, such as the kashaka (or kosika), rain sticks, bells, and wooden sticks. ¹

Many African languages are tonal, leading to a close relationship between music and language in some local cultures. In these communities, vocal sounds and physical movements accompany musical performance. In singing, the tonal patterns of the language impose constraints on the melodic patterns. Conversely, in instrumental music, native speakers can often perceive implied text or meanings within the music. This is also the basis of drum languages, or "talking drums". ¹

Historically, several factors have influenced the traditional music of Africa. Language, environment, diverse cultural practices, politics, and population movement have all contributed to its development. Each African group evolved in a different area of the continent, they experienced different climates, foods, and interactions with neighboring peoples. Each group moved at different rates and to different places than others, and thus each was influenced by different people and circumstances. In addition, these communities operated under different forms of governance, which further contributed to the diversity of the music that was created throughout Africa. ¹

The text above is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Music of Africa”, available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 licence. ¹

music of Africa is diverse musical traditions and genres of the African continent, according to the structured record cited below. This entry was generated automatically from that record and has not yet been reviewed by a person familiar with the tradition. ²

The source record links this tradition to 15 external registers, which can be verified through the citation. ²