"Indépendance cha cha": African pop music since the independence era

Abstract

Investigating why Latin American music came to be the sound-track of the independence era, this contribution offers an overview of musical developments and cultural politics in certain sub-Saharan African countries since the 1960s. Focusing first on how the governments of newly independent African states used musical styles and musicians to support their nation-building projects, the article then looks at musicians' more recent perspectives on the independence era.