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AG Guide to World Music
The term World music is a self-centered term that refers to any music that is not part of United States or European Pop traditions. It can be anything from Chinese Folk songs to African Blues. World music is not any music made elsewhere, but music made elsewhere that relies to some extent upon native or traditional styles or instrumentation. In other words an Javain Punk Rock group is not World but Punk, but a Javain Punk band that uses poetry derived from Macapat Poetry would be World.
African:
There are thousands of different styles of music coming out of the continent of Africa. African music, through the forced Diaspora of the African people, has been highly influential throughout the world. Blues, Jazz, Rock and Roll, Samba, Bossa Nova, Reggae, Hip Hop and everything that came out of those styles owes much to African traditional styles. In turn much modern African music has absorbed and adapted to modern international styles. The sounds of Rock, Jazz, Reggae, and Hip Hop and everything in between are filtered through tradition to form a number of different, modern African styles.
Traditional African:
Traditional is a catch-all term for any style of music not directly influenced by modern, international sounds. It could be anything from Arab singing to Nigerian drumming. Traditional music is typically categorized by its country or region of origin.
AfroPop:
AfroPop is an umbrella term referring to all modern African music. Everything from AfroBeat to Rai to Soukous is AfroPop.
Afro-Beat:
Afro-Beat is a West African dance music highly influenced by Nigerian Highlife and American Jazz and Funk. Imagine the James Brown band really high and playing with a group of tribal drummers and dancers. AfroBeat is largely the creation of one man, the late Fela Anikulapo Kuti. Fela, a Nigerian singer, saxophone player, and keyboardist fused Nigerian Highlife rhythms and chants with Jazz-Funk, black consciousness and black nationalism. Fela’s son Femi carries the AfroBeat torch today.
Mbalax:
Mbalax is a Senegalese conglomeration of traditional rhythms and instruments with Afro-Cuban Jazz. The Star Band and its most famous alum, Youssou N’Dour, are prime examples of Mbalax.
Rai
Rai is a North African, mainly Algerian, style of music which combines traditional Berber, Arab and Beduin musical styles with a myriad of modern influences from Jazz and Rock to Reggae and Hip Hop. Cheb Mami and Cheb Khaled make excellent, funky, and soulful Rai music.
Asian
Asia is a huge continent and has produced a vast array of different musical styles. For the most part these are categorized according to country or region of origin.
Indian Classical:
Indian Classical music is complex, religious and improvisational. Featuring instruments such as Sitar and Tabla, and performed in long, meditative Ragas (organized more around keys and modes than melodies), much of what we know today of this music was influenced by Padma-Vibhu san Acharya Allauddin Khan. Great modern performers include his son, Ali Akbar Khan, and Ravi Shankar.
Bombay Pop:
Bombay, or Indian Pop, is music produced in Bombay by the massive film industry. It combines traditional Indian vocal techniques with European and American Pop production styles. Despite its modern influences Bombay Pop maintains a decidedly Indian tonal scale.
Qawwalli:
Qawwali is an Islamic devotional music from Pakistan. Its soaring melodies and meditative rhythms are used as religious meditation. Qawwali has found international popularity through the work of the late Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan.
(from AMG) Qawwali is the exception to the rule for Islamic religious ceremonies; music is not allowed. Qawwali is popular in Pakistan and India and is played occasionally during weddings, child birth, and when a child is learning to read the Koran. The music is characterized primarily by its quick rhythms so that listeners can become inspired. — Keith Johnson
Cadence:
A constantly changing style, Cadence evolved primarily among the islands of Guadeloupe, Martinique, Dominica, and Haiti. The cadence era was exciting and extremely fertile, requiring musicians of only the highest caliber, who could master not only Antilles pop styles like beguine and Creole mazurka, but also those of Haiti and the other neighboring islands. The cadence years saw the evolution of the pop influences that embellish the rootsier foundation of today's Antilles musicians, allowing for expression in an internationally familiar musical language: electric instruments, riffing horn sections, trap set drums, topical lyrics, and specific stylings of rock music, reggae, soca, American black music, and more. In addition to Les Aiglons, this was the heyday of big bands like La Perfecta, Typical Combo, La Selecta, Les Maxels, Les Lopards, Les Vikings de la Guadeloupe (whose co-leader, Pierre-Edouard Decimus, went on to create the group Kassav' at the end of the decade), and Gordon Henderson's Exile One of Dominique. Recordings from this era, while fascinating and enjoyable, often suffer from out-of-tune instruments and subpar recording quality. Cadence led directly into the early '80s and the rise of zouk, and it was the musicians schooled in cadence who were the first zouk stars. The major catalyst behind the emergence of zouk was the desire to produce a new Caribbean music that treated the multifaceted music of the Antilles to the state-of-the-art recording technology of the Paris studios.
Beguine:
Throughout the long history of the Beguine, the dominant sound has been that of the clarinet and trombone (both solo and as a duet), and it can still be heard today throughout the Antilles musical milieu, from the most traditional music to the cadence era or the pop sounds of today's zouk. While the phrasing often recalls New Orleans jazz, the overall sound is unmistakably Caribbean. Any contemporary music that uses beguine as its base, even that which ventures as far off as contemporary jazz, is considered "beguine moderne." The classic music of carnival in the Antilles is an uptempo version of the beguine rhythm, called "beguine vide."
Beguine Vide:
The classic music of carnival in the Antilles is an uptempo version of the beguine rhythm, called Beguine Vide.
Beguine Moderne:
Contemporary music that uses beguine as its base, even that which ventures as far off as contemporary jazz, is considered Beguine Moderne.
Celtic:
Celtic music is the traditional music of Ireland, Scotland, England, and Wales. Though the musical conventions are slightly different according to geography, Celtic music is easily recognizable, and is most often played on instruments like the harp, the tin whistle, the fiddle, the bodran, and the uillean bagpipes. In general, Celtic music can be seperated into dance tunes, of which there are many different types, and slower ballads. Famous Celtic artists are the Chieftains, the Bothy Band, Clannad, and the Boys of the Lough.
Eastern European:
The term "Eastern European music" covers a wide variety of genres, from Jewish Klezmer to Transylvanian choral music to Polka from Poland. The constant turmoil and changing of national borders in parts of Eastern Europe has had the effect of mixing these genres up so much that often Eastern European groups play an assortment of many different styles. The group Muzikas, for example, has released albums of Jewish Klezmer music, gypsy folk music, and Eastern European interpretations of Bartok. Keeping the genres clearly delineated can often be difficult when the artists themselves mix them so freely.
Klezmer:
Klezmer is Jewish celebratory music, traditionally drumless and arranged for such instruments as clarinet, violin, and accordion. Its mood ranging from jumpily frenetic to gracefully elegant, Klezmer is one of the most entertaining musical genres there is.
Indigenous Music:
Indigenous music is the most varied genre there is, as the forms, styles, and even instruments indigenous music can be played on are often particular to one small tribe. The original, and richest, genre, and about as far from “pop” music, in composition, intention, and execution, as you can get.
Calypso:
The musical output of Trinidad and Tobago — Calypso, steel band music, and soca — is centered around the carnival season that begins shortly after Christmas and culminates with Carnival Tuesday, the day before the Catholic feast of Ash Wednesday. The island calypsonians compose (or buy) at least two new songs annually, which they then perform nightly throughout carnival season at the calypso tents. Of course, all those who can arrange it will also produce recordings of their songs that will be released sometime between Thanksgiving and a few weeks before Carnival Tuesday.
The annual music crop is highly affected by two major music contests in which the vast majority of calypsonians compete during carnival season: the National Calypso Monarchy (best calypsonian of the year) and the Road March (best party song of the year), as well as by a host of other smaller competitions like Junior Monarch, Calypso Queen, and Extempo Monarch. Most compositions are a reflection of attempts of calypsonians to win these competitions. Consequently, they fall into two camps: party songs vying for Road March and lyrically strong calypsos vying for the Monarchy by addressing a wide range of social and political topics.
Merengue:
Merengue music originated in the Dominican Republic where it remains wildly popular. Often played with both a tambora drum and an accordion, Merengue music was a major influence on Salsa.
Son:
Son, or Rumba, as it is often known in the U.S., was the dominant form of music in Cuba before Salsa took over. This is the music documented in the Buena Vista Social Club.
Salsa:
Salsa grew out of Cuban "Son" music, (often called Rumba in the United States). Primarily a dance medium, Salsa is a Cuban and Puerto Rican phenomenon that has had much international success with artists such as Tito Puente, Joe Arroyo and Ruben Blades.
Samba:
Samba is a term for a number of related Afro-Brazillian musical styles. Complex rhythms and instrumentation make this folk music fast and dancey yet its lack of syncopation gives it a very un-African sound. Sergio Mendes is a popular Brazilian artist who has recorded quite a bit of Samba music.
Mini Jazz:
Originating in Haiti during the 1960s, the mini-jazz movement was influenced by other Caribbean music styles, the British Invasion, and French pop. Comprised of electric guitar, bass, saxophone, and drums, these mini-jazz groups — most of them teenagers — covered imported pop hits and traditional Haitian classics; by the 1970s, many of them developed into larger and more proficient units, some even relocating to the U.S. to seek fame and fortune.
Tropicalia:
Tropicalia was a revolutionary musical movement arising in Brazil in the late ‘60s. Taking their inspiration from Bossa Nova, Brazilian Folk and American Psychedelic Rock, artists like Gilberto Gil and Caetano Veloso created sublime and dangerous music. The movement was crushed violently by Brazil’s military dictatorship and Gil and Veloso were exiled for as number of years. Tropicalia died out only in name however and continued to flower and grow as MPB (Musica Populare Brazilia). Gil and Costa continue to create, as do other great artists such as Airto and Flora Purem, Thom Ze, and Azymuth.
MPB:
Modern, popular Brazilian music. An amalgamation of Tropicalia, Bossa Nova, Reggae, Rock and everything in between.
Western European:
Western European music is an extremely general geographic term encompassing French cabaret music from the 50s, Flamenco from Spain, and German folk tunes, among countless other genres.
Polka:
The Polka is a dance that originated in Bohemia around 1830. Throughout the 19th century it became quite popular in both Europe and the United States. The tempo of the dance is moderately fast and is set in a duple meter of 2/4. During the late 19th century polkas were composed by a number of ballroom composers, including Johann Strauss, both the younger and elder.
Zouk:
Zouk is a contemporary dance music of the Caribbean that uses both traditional and high-tech musical resources. It is based on interlocking rhythmic and melodic patterns rather than a dense sound where all instruments are played simultaneously. It is connected to a number of Caribbean musical styles such as biguine, merengue, compass direct, cadence, guaguancó, and danzon. Like all of these musical styles, in zouk, rhythm is one of the most significant elements. There are many musical influences on zouk, and the differences between borrowed styles are often smoothed over rather than accentuated. Strong beats are reinforced and the syncopated bass pattern, like that of salsa or funk, is not used. The timbre of the music (its color, the different ways music "sounds") are a vital element in zouk. By using the technical resources available to musicians today, sound can be manipulated to make the familiar sound new. The sound of the conga may be manipulated electronically to give it a variety of sounds. A drum set may receive the same treatment with some parts of the set being left "natural" while others are altered. A basic rule of zouk is to create space in the music by avoiding an overwhelming density of simultaneous parts, allowing the insertion of interesting sounds into the "holes" that are created. Zouk instrumentation usually includes a brass section, two synthesizers, guitar, and bass, and a rhythm section that includes a gourd shaker, conga, drum set, and tumba. The bass line is more than a rhythmic or harmonic instrument, having taken on more of a melodic function. Of the two synthesizers, one acts as a percussion instrument, reproducing what the percussion instruments do, while the other inserts melodic lines at strategic locations. The guitar plays melodic riffs (short repeated melodic phrases) rather than strumming chords, and is also used for solos. The brass section plays in unison, rarely soloing, and is sometimes used to set up counterpoint to the main melody.
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