Afropop Worldwide

In 2018, the renowned music journal Fact boldly claimed that “the world’s best electronic music festival is in Uganda.” In only a few years, Nyege Nyege has indeed become one of the hottest artistic hubs in East Africa, birthing two music labels that propelled local scenes, such as Ugandan acholitronix or Tanzanian singeli, across the globe. At the heart of this explosive universe lies a big house, known as “the Villa,” that almost constantly vibrates with sounds as musicians from the region and beyond tirelessly produce, exchange skills, and frenetically party until dawn. Despite reducing the Villa’s bubbling flow, COVID-19 didn’t silence it, and the house kept on nurturing its community of underground musicians. In this episode, producer Basile Koechlin takes us to the Villa to meet current residents and other members of the Nyege Nyege nebula. Through a patchwork of stories, soundscapes, and fresh musical releases, we hear more about this unique and strange place that came to host and generate a seminal pa

Foutanga Babani Sissoko, known also as Baba Sora, was one of the most generous patrons of Malian musicians, particularly griots, in modern times. His gifts of cash, gold, cars and houses are legendary, and the amount of music he inspired was voluminous. But the source of all those riches turned out to be dubious, to say the least. And when he died in March 2021, he had spent his latter years a poor man. In this episode we hear the man, the music and the remembrances of those whose lives were changed by his extraordinary generosity. Produced by Banning Eyre. APWW #842

Congolese guitar is one of the pearls of African music. Intricate, joyful and seriously challenging, it’s long been a passion of producer/guitarist Banning Eyre. Through an innovative new online learning website—the World Music Method—he met guitarist Niwel Tsumbu, a brilliant guitarist and teacher, who delves here into Congo guitar history. Produced by Banning Eyre.

We trace the history of this most American of instruments from its ancestors in West Africa through the Caribbean and American South and into the present, as a new generation of Black women artists reclaim the banjo as their own. Rhiannon Giddens, Bassekou Kouyate, Bela Fleck and more talk claw-hammers, trad jazz, Appalachian folk, African ancestors and the on-going story of American music, which would be woefully incomplete without a Black history of the banjo. Produced by Ben Richmond

Toronto is Canada’s most cosmopolitan city--“like New York but mellower” in the words of Kofi Akah, son of the Ghanaian highlife legend Jewel Akah. Kofi is one of many superb African artists who have made Toronto their home over the years. That list is long, and it has included highlife star Pat Thomas, South Sudanese rapper Emanuel Jal, rising Congolese star Blandine, Malagasy guitarist Donné Roberts, and a hidden treasure of Ethiopian music, Fantahun Shewankochew. In this program, we take the pulse of Toronto’s African scene through music and interviews with Kofi, Emanuel, Blandine, Fantahun and many more. Produced by Banning Eyre APWW #830

In 1985, Sean Barlow made his first trip to Africa to check out musical life there. Afropop Worldwide was still a dream at that point, but the experiences he had on that trip put wind in his sails. One highlight was the afternoon he spent interviewing Luambo Makiadi a.k.a. Franco at the bandleader's home in the Limité neighborhood of Kinshasa. Franco had recently played his first concerts in the United States. Although few outside the African diaspora community had any idea who he was, Franco was by then a legend, a superstar in Africa. In this podcast we hear from the man himself, nestled on a porch swing, his acoustic guitar cradled on his lap, in conversation with a somewhat green American journalist with a bright future. Produced by Banning Eyre. Afropop Closeup Season Six

During the last 60 years, Jamaican music has constantly reinvented itself, a handful of innovators pioneering distinct musical genres such as ska, rock steady, reggae and dancehall, as well shorter-lived subgenres. But Jamaica's musical trendsetters did much more than just shake up the island's music scene. At crucial intervals, their inventiveness has dramatically changed or even spawned a range of popular forms overseas—sewing seeds for rap via the deejay style and stimulating remix culture through dub. In "The Gorgon, The Originator and The Dub Master," producer David Katz leads a tour of indelible changes brought about by producer Bunny "Striker" Lee, Deejay U Roy and the engineer and sound system owner, King Tubby, to demonstrate how they changed popular music worldwide. All photos ©David Katz. Produced by David Katz. APWW #841

Kenya’s Kakuma Refugee Camp is a virtual city of people displaced by three decades of war in East and Central Africa. Kenyan music producer Treynor Tumwa and American musician/scholar Mark LeVine founded Kakuma Sound to provide traditional instruments to the camp’s talented artists. Hosted by Banning Eyre.

Changüí is a little understood, loose and lively, community-based music of eastern Cuba. In this program we sample recordings from the 2021 box set Changüí: The Sound of Guantánamo, and hear from Gianluca Tramontana, the man who made the recordings. Rooted in Afro-Haitian music, pan-Caribbean styles, Spanish poetic traditions and more, Changüí emerged in the mid 19th century in plantations, not unlike the blues. We also hear from musician and scholar Ben Lapidus, author of the only English language book on Changüí, and we update the story with Changüí fusions into jazz, salsa and hip-hop. Prepare to dance! Produced by Banning Eyre. APWW #840

With a style all her own, Yasmin Williams has gone from video game virtuoso to one of the freshest and most original solo acoustic guitarists today. She talks to producer Ben Richmond about her influences, her unique instrumentation, and forging her own path as a young Black woman artist in a genre dominated by white dudes. Afropop Closeup Season 6

The Kenyan capital is roaring into the 2020s. On this program singer/songwriter/producer Eric Wainaina introduces us to a rising cadre of artists rocking the Nairobi scene. From hip-hop and dancehall to r&b and Gengetone, the city’s cultural melting pot is coming to a boil at a time of political change when artists are finding their voices to speak out against government corruption and champion social justice movements. We meet artists on the front line--Juliani, Karun and Blinky Bill—and take a side trip to Kakuma, one of Africa’s largest refugee camps where music, including hop-hop, is literaliy a matter of survival. Produced by Banning Eyre. APWW #831

On March 6, 1971, a group of some of the top musicians from the United States – Ike & Tina Turner, Wilson Pickett, The Staples Singers, and more – boarded a plane bound for Ghana to perform in a musical celebration that was dubbed the “Soul to Soul Festival”. Thousands of audience members filled Accra’s Black Star Square for a continuous 15 hours of music. The festival was planned in part for the annual celebration of Ghana’s independence, but also an invitation for a “homecoming” for these noted African-American artists to return to Africa. This episode revisits the famed music festival at its 50th Anniversary and explores the longstanding legacy of cultural exchange with African diasporans originally set forth in the 1950s by Kwame Nkrumah, the first President of Ghana. Tune in for interviews with noted musicologist John Collins, poet and scholar Tsitsi Ella Jaji, concert goers and more. Produced by Brandi Howell. APWW #829

Special guest Dr. Ivor Miller, back from a 2021 research trip to Cameroon, takes us into the complexities of south Cameroonian spiritual tradition and its connection to the Cuban Abakuá secret society for men. Featuring Abakuá-themed music from Cuba, ceremonial music from Cameroon, and Batanga pop by Chief Eko Roosevelt, Pablo Gabbana, and Emily Sadey. Produced by Ned Sublette.

Known by names like krar, kisara, tambur, simsimiyya and masinkob, the lyres of East Africa represent some of the world’s oldest string instruments. The Otaak Band is dedicated to uplifting and advancing these traditions. Otaak founder Miguel Merino tells the story with audio from his work in Egypt during the pandemic. Produced by Miguel Merino. Afropop Closeup Season Six.

When it comes to popular music, it's hard to top Brazil for variety, excellence and sheer volume. On this program, Georges Collinet welcomes co-host Béco Dranoff in Brazil. Béco is a producer, broadcaster and lifelong connoisseur of Brazilian music. He recently returned to Sao Paulo after some three decades in New York City. He takes us on a whirlwind tour of music produced during the pandemic, from funk to hip-hop, to mangue beat and cool singer-songwriters, it's a feast of new talent for Brazilian music fans everywhere. Produced by Sean Barlow and Beco Dranoff. APWW #838

It’s a truism that jazz has roots in Africa, but compared with other forms of Black American music, it doesn’t have a large audience there. Just the same, African musicians have long been smitten with jazz, and have always found inventive ways to incorporate jazz elements into their sounds. On this program we meet young artists forging new paths in Afro-Jazz: Etuk Ubong from Nigeria, Awale Jant Band from Senegal by way of London, Afrikan Protokol form Burkina Faso by way of Belgium. It’s a freewheeling musical joyride. Produced by Banning Eyre. [APWW #827]

Producer Matthew Key—AKA DJ M-Point goes deep with a rising South African artist/producer on the evolution of kwaito and hip-hop in one of Africa’s most exciting contemporary music scenes. Afropop Closeup Season Six

The dembow, the beat behind reggaetón, is much more than just a backdrop for a night of partying and dancing. The style of music, widely associated with Puerto Rico and forged from a mixture of Jamaican dancehall, Panamanian reggae en español, and American hip hop, has always existed as a form of social and political resistance, and continues to do so in 2020. And as such, it has endured constant attempts to criminalize, censor, and police both the music and those who consume it, from the early tape-confiscations by Puerto Rican law enforcement in the 1990s underground scene to the present day, arguing its hypersexual content. In this episode we speak with Latin and Caribbean music scholars and social workers to break down the racist and sexist undertones of the genre's constant policing, as well as examples of songs by artists such as Tego Calderón and Ivy Queen, that counter these assumptions. We also take a couple of detours to explore how this music, and these criticisms, manifest in the Dominican Republi

Belo Horizonte is Brazil’s sixth largest city and including its surrounding districts, the country’s third largest metropolitan area. The capital of Minas Gerais, a state built on mining, dairy products and coffee production, Belo Horizonte is often seen as a parochial, conservative backwater, yet its thriving alternative arts scene provides robust forms of musical and cultural resistance to the exclusionary policies of reactionary president, Jair Bolsonaro, especially through local variants of hip-hop and reggae. Produced in Belo Horizonte by David Katz, this program explores the intricacies of the city’s homegrown resistance movements, based in squatted buildings and public spaces in the city center and peripheral favelas on the outskirts. It reveals the surprising complexities of the renowned Belo Horizonte rap scene, which is intricately linked to improv theatre and urban poetry movements, with a revived Carnival culture, African-Brazilian Candomblé and baile funk all part of the local form’s very distinc

Prior to the pandemic, London’s jazz scene was blooming and gaining a worldwide reputation for innovation. The folks at Jazz Refreshed had everything to do with that. Jazz singer and producer Tess Hirst tells the story. Afropop Closeup Season 6