Kenyan Music: Past, Present and Future

Kenyan Music: Past, Present and Future

Kenyan Music: Past, Present and Future

Kenya's pop music is undoubtedly one of the most diverse in Africa. Unfortunately, by the time her music has passed through the long filtering process of the international "market," only a handful of titles make it to people's houses.

Popular music in Kenya encompasses a wide range of styles of both local and international origin. Among Kenyans, language is one of the crucial factors in defining their music.

There are over 40 regional languages in Kenya and musicians from at least a quarter of these (usually, those with the largest populations) are making recordings in their mother tongues. However, not all Kenyan musicians play to a regional/ethnic audience.

Furthermore, many of Kenya's best known musicians are immigrants from other African countries, most often, from Tanzania or Zaire. Without a regional focus, the lyrics of these musicians are usually in Swahili, the African language of wider communication across Kenya. A few of the Zaireans occasionally sing in their own language, Lingala, but in recent years, most have found it advantageous to use Swahili in their new compositions.

In Luo benga, the bass, guitar, and vocal interweave is all-important. The bass, in particular, is especially active, pulsating, starting and stopping in bursts of rapid fire. Sometimes it mimics a flowing melodic line with syncopated hesitations. Other times, it's just hanging around the bottom keeping a fast-paced rhythm. Meanwhile, guitars are coming in at the end of each vocal phrase with some catchy riff or a repeat of the melodic line.

As benga caught on among the Luo people, musicians from other regions of Kenya borrowed elements of it to suit their own music. Some of these early benga adaptations such as those from Daniel Kamau (DK) are featured on the Guitar Paradise and Kenya Dance Mania CDs. DK, one of the 70's biggest stars, is cited as the first Kikuyu musician to jump onto the benga band wagon back in the late 1960s.

Although these regional groups share a number of common components in their instrumentation, rhythms, the beat of a throbbing kick drum, and aspects of the guitar work, these are all features which overlay unique traditional elements in melodic structure, harmony, and song composition. Thus, each of the different regional bengas, has its own distinctive flavor. Read more at Enchanted Landscapes Music

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