Universally Heard part 1

Well lovies, took me a couple of days of rather quite frusterating indecision, buuuut I FINALY made my decision on our new "squeeze" for the day! Normally I would just take one day for the one blog, but this is too big for just one day, so I think we'll stretch it out a bit(: whatchy'all think?
Ok, so let me get to the point here. I am going to be looking into, listening to, and sharing my findings with you about different kinds and forms of music from around the world! May sound a bit bland or PBS kids at first, but you'd really be surprised about what you'll learn and find out.
I think today, we can dooo... South Africa! (:

South Africa:
In the 1600s, in the Dutch colonial era, from the 17th century on, indigenous tribes people and slaves imported from the east adapted Western musical instruments and ideas. A tribe called the Khoi-Khoi developed the ramkie, a guitar with three or four strings, based on that of Malabar slaves. They used it to blend Khoi and Western folk songs. Then there was this instrument called the mamokhorong. It was a single-string violin that was used by the Khoi in their own music making and in the dances of the colonial centre, Cape Town, which rapidly became a melting pot of cultural influences from all over the world.
In the 1800's, a style similar to that of British marching military bands, coloured (or a mixed race) bands of musicians began parading through the streets of Cape Town in the early 1820s, a tradition that was given added impetus by the travelling minstrel shows of the 1880s. This tradition has continued to the present day with the great carnival held in Cape Town every New Year.
In the late 1800s, early African composers such as John Knox Bokwe began composing hymns that drew on traditional Xhosa harmonic patterns. The development of a black urban proletariat and the movement of many black workers to the mines in the 1800s meant that differing regional traditional folk music met and began to flow into one another. Western instrumentation was used to adapt rural songs, which in turn started to influence the development of new hybrid styles of music-making (as well as dances) in the developing urban centres.
Throughout the 1900's, many different artists started to arise and different styles of music started to take over South Africa's musical culture. Artists such as Eric Gallo, Solomon Linda and Yvonne Chaka Chaka began to rise and became rather popular. In 1997, pop legend Brenda Fassie hit it big time and made hugs hits such as "Memeza" (meaning "Shout"), which spawned the huge hit "Vulindlela" ("Clear the path" or "Make way"). She became the reformer for music for all of the Afrikaans, but then sadly (but not shockingly) she died of a drug overdose in 2004.

I know, probably a little boring, but I found it rather interesting, and enlightening.

Here are a couple of links for some of the songs that were listed above!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-sSgJNh_cQQ     This one's for Memeza by Brenda Fassie!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxOepJiw4K4       aaand this one is Vulindlela also by Brenda Fassie!
(I'm actually rather beginning to like her alot!) Not too bad, I can see why she was a hit(:

Aaaand so my dears, I shall be back tomorrow, where I will post yet another fun country's culture in music (:
ta-ta for now.
xoxo