Many genres of popular music like blues, jazz, afrobeats, salsa, zouk, and rumba derive to varying degrees on musical traditions from Africa, taken to the Americas by enslaved Africans. These rhythms and sounds have subsequently been adapted by newer genres like rock, and rhythm and blues.
What is traditional African music called?
Gnawa, also known as Ethno-Pop or Gnawi Blues, comes from the Sahara Desert. This music style is based around a north African repertoire of ancient African spiritual religious songs and rhythms. Its well-preserved heritage combines ritual poetry with traditional music and dance.
What are the vocal music of Africa?
Vocal Forms of African Music 1. Maracatu Surfaced in the African state of Pernambuco, combining the strong rhythms of African percussion instruments with Portugese melodies. It uses mostly percussion instruments such as the alfaia, tarol, and caixa-de-Guerra, gongue, agbe, and miniero.
What are the 8 types of African music?
List of Music Genres in Africa
- Afrobeat. Fela Kuti created Afrobeat by fusing traditional Nigerian music, jazz and highlife. …
- Apala. Apala is a percussion-based style of the Muslim Yoruba people in Nigeria, West Africa.
- Assiko. Assiko is a rhythmic dance from Cameroon.
- Bikutsi. …
- Benga music. …
- Bongo Flava (Tanzania)
- Cabo-Love (Cape Verde)
- Chimurenga music.
What is West African music called?
Afrobeat is a music genre with major popularity throughout West Africa. … Afrobeat is influenced by palm-wine music and Ghanaian highlife, as well as jazz, funk and fuji. Fela Kuti devised the term ‘Afrobeat’ as early as 1968 in his home country of Nigeria.
What are the 5 most important features of African music?
Aerophones (wind)
- Flutes (bamboo, horn)
- Ocarinas.
- Panpipes.
- Horns from animal tusks.
- Trumpets wood or metal.
- Pipes being single or double reeds.
- Whistle.
What are the elements of African music?
African musical instruments include a wide range of drums, slit gongs, rattles and double bells, different types of harps, and harp-like instruments such as the Kora and the ngoni, as well as fiddles, many kinds of xylophone and lamellophone such as the mbira, and different types of wind instrument like flutes and …
What are the 5 vocal forms of African music?
Terms in this set (5)
- Maracatu. first surfaced in the African state of Pernambuco, combining the strong rhythms of African percussion instruments with Portuguese melodies.
- Blues. a musical form of the late 19th century that has had deep roots in African-American communities. …
- Soul. …
- Spiritual. …
- Call and Response.
What is the most important element of African music?
The music of West Africa is characterized by two main aspects: rhythm and melody. The rhythm is generally the most important, and West African songs are polyrhythmic featuring two or more conflicting rhythms.
Is falsetto rarely used in African music?
The use of falsetto is considered uncommon in normal Western speech and is most often employed within the context of humor. However, the use of falsetto speech varies by culture and its use has been studied in African Americans and gay men in certain contexts. Its use has also been noted in the U.S. South.
What is the oldest African instrument?
The bolon is one of the oldest of the West African stringed instruments and was originally associated with the hunting and warrior traditions.
What is the most popular instrument in Africa?
Most widely spread and played instruments in Africa are the drum, the xylophone, the mbira, rattles and shakers.
Why is African music unique?
African singers use a wide variety of sounds. The melodies are short, repeated over and over, also include whistles and yodels which is peculiar to African style of music. Soloist often improvises new melodies while the chorus continuous with the original melody creating a polyphonic structure.
What makes West African music unique?
The music of West Africa is characterized by two main aspects: rhythm and melody. The rhythm is generally the most important, and West African songs are polyrhythmic featuring two or more conflicting rhythms. … Rhythms are often played by percussion instruments, but also from the sounds of dancing.
What are the characteristics of West African drumming?
Ensembles of drums, bells, and rattles organize themselves around a timeline most often played on a bell which can be heard above the other instruments. Off-beat rhythmic patterns that have syncopation are common.
How did African music start?
Early attempts at notating African music were made by T.E. … The single and double iron bells, which probably originated in Kwa-speaking West Africa, spread to western Central Africa with Iron Age Bantu-speaking peoples and from there to Zimbabwe and the Zambezi River valley.