Music
Sipho “Hotstix” Mabuse: the Soweto musician behind Burn Out
Sipho "Hotstix" Mabuse, born in Soweto in 1951, played drums with the band Harari before becoming a solo…
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George Darko and burger highlife: the Ghanaian sound made in Germany
In the early 1980s, Ghanaian musicians living in Germany created burger highlife, a version of highlife played with…
Music
Fatai Rolling Dollar: the palm-wine guitarist who found fame again in his eighties
Fatai Rolling Dollar played palm-wine and highlife guitar in Lagos from the 1950s. After decades out of the…
Arts + Culture
Fela! on Broadway: how Fela Kuti’s story reached New York’s stages
The musical Fela!, directed and choreographed by Bill T. Jones, opened on Broadway in 2009. Built around Fela…
Arts + Culture
Akuaba: the Asante wooden figures carried by women hoping for a child
Akuaba are small carved wooden figures with flat, round heads, made by Akan carvers in Ghana. By tradition,…
Arts + Culture
The Dogon kanaga mask: dancing for the dead on the Bandiagara cliffs
The Dogon people of Mali's Bandiagara Escarpment are known for their masked dances, above all the kanaga mask…
Music
The Lijadu Sisters: Nigeria’s twin voices of 1970s Afro-funk
Twins Taiwo and Kehinde Lijadu recorded sharp, harmony-driven Afro-funk and Afro-rock in 1970s Lagos. Their records, long hard…
Arts + Culture
The Bamileke elephant mask: beaded power from the Cameroon Grassfields
In the Grassfields of western Cameroon, Bamileke masquerades feature striking beaded cloth masks with long panels and round…
Music
Kassé Mady Diabaté: the griot voice of Mali who sang with Buena Vista veterans
Kassé Mady Diabaté, born into a griot family in Mali in 1949, was one of the great singers…
Music
Alemayehu Eshete: the “Ethiopian Elvis” of Addis Ababa’s golden age
Alemayehu Eshete was one of the stars of Addis Ababa's musical golden age in the 1960s and 1970s.…