Afropop Worldwide

In hard times and boom times, people in Ghana know how to party. In this program, we hear regional pop and neo-traditional music at festivals, funerals and community celebrations across the county. We travel to the lush...

Tarab, the ecstatic feeling associated with listening to and playing great music, is a fundamental characteristic in many varieties of Arab music. In this program, we explore tarab with special guest UCLA...

Sweet accordion riffs, the steady twang of the triangle, and the off-beat pounding of the zabumba drum make forro a favorite for all Brazilians. The infectious tunes and syncopated beats have been described as "a...

The massive Niger River Delta is a fantastically rich cultural region and ecosystem. Unfortunately, it has been laid low by the brutal Biafran War (1967-70) and by decades of destructive and mismanaged oil exploration...

Salegy may be the most popular dance music of Madagascar. It’s a churning, harmonious groove with spine-stiffening vocal harmonies that emerged from towns and cities of northern Madagascar in the mid-20th century. On a...

On a visit to the U.S. Virgin Islands in winter 2018, we took the pulse of the national music of St. Croix – quelbe. Rarely recorded, rarely exported, quelbe is an energetic form, led by sax or flute with percussion and...

AR04_NouraMintSeymali by Afropop Worldwide

Cabo Verde (aka Cape Verde) has long been known as a music powerhouse. Despite its little size (population: 500,000), the West African archipelago is the third largest country in music sales in the “World” market by...

Since the 1960s in Jamaica, iconic figures such as Bob Marley have gathered in backyards to write reggae anthems that conquered world charts. The yard remains a cornerstone in Jamaican culture. Musicians withdraw from...

Join us on a musical adventure into the storied past of Africa's Rainbow Nation. In 2016, 20-plus years removed from apartheid, South Africa was a nation deep in transition. And, that was reflected in its music—brimming...

Musicians create worlds of their own. They are sonic alchemists. This program, originally produced in 2007, surveys a wide range of artists from throughout the African diaspora, artists with this special ability to spin...

It turns out that the first American city to host a roster of local African bands was not New York, Miami or Chicago, but the San Francisco Bay Area of northern California. Hugh Masekela brought Hedzoleh Soundz from...

Bachata is a music of the people. Recalling the American blues, bachata was infamous as the anthem of the hard-drinking, womanizing, down-on-his-luck man, vilified as the entertainment of the brothels and the cabarets...

On January 8, 1959, Fidel Castro and his ragtag army marched into Havana and proclaimed victory in the Cuban revolution. Much of the world knew Cuba primarily from its 1930 megahit "El Manicero" ("The Peanut Vendor")...

This classic episode features Afropop Worldwide’s original live recordings of stellar artists Joe Arroyo (Colombia) in London, Paulina Tomayo (Ecuador) in Quito, Los Muñequitos de Matanzas (Cuba) in New York, Los Van...

The first time Puerto Rican bandleader Willie Rosario heard the word salsa applied to the Cuban-style music he played was in Venezuela, where DJ Phidias Danilo first popularized it. Subsequently applied as a marketing...

In this Hip Deep edition, Afropop producer Wills Glasspeigel heads to South Africa to reveal the story of the inimitable Hugh Tracey, a field recordist born at the turn of the 20th century in England. A wayward youth...

Islam's complex relationship with arts and culture across Africa, the Middle East, and Asia presents special paradoxes and intrigue in the realm of music. Islam has been used both to nurture and curtail musical...

The "Black Pacific" is a term coined by our guide, ethnomusicologist Heidi Carolyn Feldman. She describes the circumstance of African descendants displaced not only from their ancestral homes in Africa, but also from...

On a return trip to Madagascar, we catch up with and hear new music from tsapiky maestro Damily, the “King of Salegy” Jaojoby, an exciting new duo starring Sammy of Tarika Sammy, Toko Telo and more. This music-rich...

Nigeria is the undisputed powerhouse of African pop music. Call it Naija Pop, Afrobeats, Afropop or what have you. The likes of Burna Boy, Wizkid, Yemi Alade, Tiwa Savage, Olamide and Fireboy DML are giants on the...

Guinea's legendary dance band, Bembeya Jazz, are a pillar of modern West African history. Begun in 1961 in the flush of Guinea's independence and Sekou Toure's maverick presidency, the band played under the inspired...

In this episode, Afropop dives into a celebration of the blues--for some, the essence of the American experience and for others a link back into a lost history in Africa. For our program, we also went back through a...

Afropop’s Banning Eyre published his prize-winning biography of Thomas Mapfumo, Lion Songs, in 2015. In this episode, he visits the Lion of Zimbabwe at his home in Eugene, Oregon, to discuss new music, the current state...

"Nollywood - Nigeria's Mirror" takes us to Lagos, the third largest film industry in the world. Scholars Jonathan Haynes and Onookome Okome serve as guides as we negotiate the intricacies and eccentricities of...