Listeners who come to traditional African music from the American variety will find it a refreshingly organic experience. The sonorities reflect a variety of instruments both ancient and modern, ...

American novelist and civil rights activist, James Baldwin had this to say about the importance of history in the present in an essay titled "White Man's Guilt". "History, as nearly no one seems to ...

Preface -- Introduction -- Part A. Components of the Mbira System -- Collecting ideas in an improvisation-based tradition : A longitudinal approach -- The mbira repertory : Central concepts -- ...

See more of our trusted coverage when you search. Prefer Newsweek on Google to see more of our trusted coverage when you search. Today's Google Doodle is celebrating Zimbabwe's national instrument, ...

A conversation between scholar Umi Vaughan and author Mahealani Uchiyama in celebration of the release of her book The Mbira, An African Musical Tradition. The book is an overview steeped in the ...

INTERNATIONALLY-ACCLAIMED United Kingdom-based Zimbabwean mbira musician Linos Wengara Magaya is living his life in Zimbabwe, having lined up four shows in Harare that started on March 20 at ...

Sometimes it takes an outsider to fully appreciate a culture’s traditions. In 1972 American musician and budding ethnomusicologist Paul Berliner traveled to Zimbabwe (then Rhodesia) to study the mbira ...

African artists are reshaping the global music scene by infusing traditional sounds with modern influences. This fusion ...

Videocassette release of film produced in 1990. Presents the music of the mbira, a small African musical instrument with flat metal keys. From traditional rituals of music and dance, through the ...

WILLIAMSTOWN -- When high-ranking Zimbabwean mbira player Forward Kwenda absorbs himself in playing his instrument, the results can be blindingly electric. "Nothing goes through my mind," Kwenda said.

A virtuoso of the mbira, a plucked instrument, he shared his knowledge with the wider world to preserve wisdom handed down orally. He died of Covid-19. By Jon Pareles This obituary is part of a series ...