african music
- Afribeat - South African based music and arts site. Reviews, artist profiles, and film and music festivals.
- Africa Sounds - Focuses on music from Central and West Africa. Includes articles on styles, top performers, new music albums, and United States concert listings.
- African Hip Hop - Platform for information and discussion on hip hop from the African continent. News, reviews, downloads amd music store.
- African Music Archive - Focuses primarily on contemporary music. Includes projects and a directory of links. [English/German]
- African Music Encyclopedia - African music styles and musicians worldwide, listing of music stores, bookstore, and links.
- African Music Hub - The hub of the African Music Discussion Group and the African Music Webring with information on how to join the group.
- African Music WebRing - Ring of sites featuring information about the music of the African Diaspora.
- African Music WebRing - List sites or join the ring.
- Afro-Caribbean Music Guide - African musicians by style, label, country, instrument, and year. Biographies, audio samples, lyrics, articles, and links.
- Afropop Worldwide - Database of articles on African music and musicians searchable by artist, style, and country. Includes radio shows, reviews and interviews, and a glossary.
- AllAfrica.com: Music Top News - Newsfeed source for news and reports on music in Africa. [English/French]
- CAMA: Explore African Music - Jukeboxes playing African styles and samples of traditional instruments.
- Columbia University: Music of Africa - Annotated directory of links.
- Dandemutande - Worldwide resource for Zimbabwean music includes e-zine, calendar of concerts and festivals, and database of performers, teachers, instrument makers, vendors, and websites.
- East African Music - Descriptions of Kenyan and Tanzanian popular music, discographies, audio files, and a profile of Samba Mapangala and Orchestra Virunga with audio samples.
- Frank Bessem's Musiques d'Afrique - Popular urban music of Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea, Mali, Senegal and Congo. Includes artist profiles, reviews, and a schedule of festivals in Europe.
- Gateway of Africa - Musicians listed by country and style. Includes biographies, discographies, worldwide concert listings, and links.
- Highlife Piccadilly - African music released on 45 rpm records in the United Kingdom between 1954 and 1981.
- The Leopard Man's Guide to African Music - Biographies, discographies, and reviews of African artists and bands. [English/Norwegian]
- Music in Eastern and Central Africa - Article by Muttu Mondiya Mama about Congolese and East African musicians and their music.
- Musique d'Afrique. - African pop music selections available in streaming audio and through download in Real Audio.
- NTAMA - Journal for African Music and Popular Culture - Articles, reviews, recent releases, events in Germany, and obituaries.
- Recordiversity - Information and images about collectable records, with the emphasis on seven-inch singles from Africa.
- Roots World: African Music - Includes artist profiles, articles, reviews, and audio samples.
- South of the Sahara: African Music - Stanford University's annotated guide to African music sites.
- Swahili Music Portal - MP3s of historical recordings fusing traditional and pop and jazz influences.
- World Music: African Music in Australasia - Includes history, instruments, musicians categorized by country and style, and interviews [Flash].
- Yahoo Groups: African Music - Mailing list established in 1995, open to all. [Requires free membership]
- Zimbabwe Music Guide - Chimurenga, jit, rhumba, sungura, soukous music and musicians. Includes profiles, discographies, audio samples, guitar tablature, listing of record labels and music stores, and links.
Africa is a large and diverse continent, consisting of dozens of countries, hundreds of languages and thousands of races, tribes and ethnic groups. As such, there is little that can be said that applies to all the music of Africa, as there is no distinctly pan-African tradition of folk or classical music of any kind; the only shared form of musical expression is popular. Nevertheless, there are regional similarities between dissimilar groups, as well as popular trends known across the continent.
Sub-Saharan music has as its distinguishing feature a rhythmic and complexity common to no other region. The remarkable aspect of African polyrhythm is the discernible coherence of the resultant rhythmic pattern. Pitch polyphony exists in the form of parallel intervals (generally thirds, fourths, and fifths), overlapping choral antiphony and solo-choral response, and occasional simultaneous independent melodies. In addition to voice, many wind and string instruments perform melodic functions. Common are bamboo flutes, ivory trumpets, and the one-string ground bow, which uses a hole in the ground as a resonator. During colonial times, European instruments such as saxophones, trumpets, and guitars were adopted by many African musicians; their sounds were integrated into the traditional patterns. Scale systems vary between regions but are generally diatonic. Music is highly functional in ethnic life, accompanying birth, marriage, hunting, and even political activities. Much music exists solely for entertainment, ranging from narrative songs to highly stylized musical theater. Similarities with other cultures, particularly Indian and Middle Eastern, can be ascribed primarily to the Islamic invasion.
African folk music is mostly functional in nature. There are many different kinds of work songs, and ceremonial or religious music, but none of these are performed outside of their intended social context. Traditional African music is rhythmically complex, and are polyrhythmic. African musical instruments include a wide array of drums and other percussion instruments, including talking drums, slit gongs, rattles and water drums, as well as melodic instruments like fiddles, harps and the balafon, and lamellophones such as the mbira.
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