{{Short description|Music genre}} {{for|the classical Arabic music genre|Tarab}} {{Music of Tanzania}} {{Infobox Music genre | name = Taarab | stylistic_origins = | cultural_origins = Late 19th century | derivatives = | subgenres = Coastal taarab | fusiongenres = | local_scenes = {{flag|Tanzania}} • {{flag|Zanzibar}} • {{flag|Kenya}} | regional_scenes = African Coastal Region | other_topics = {{hlist|Bongo Flava|Singeli|Mdundiko|Kidumbaki|Unyago}} }} [[File:Musique de Zanzibar (Institut du monde arabe, Paris) (11227343546).jpg|thumb|right|Taarab performance by Kithara Orchestra of Zanzibar in Paris]]
'''Taarab''' is a music genre popular in Tanzania and Kenya,<ref name="Edmondson_07">{{Cite book |last=Edmondson |first=Laura |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7EPcIVSHESEC |title=Performance and Politics in Tanzania: The Nation on Stage |publisher=Indiana University Press |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-253-11705-2 |editor-last=McNaughton |editor-first=Patrick |location=Bloomington, IN |language=en}}</ref><ref name="Njogu_07">{{Cite book |last1=Njogu |first1=Kimani |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=q_lWEAAAQBAJ |title=Songs and Politics in Eastern Africa |last2=Maupeu |first2=Herv |publisher=Mkuki na Nyota Publishers Ltd |year=2007 |isbn=978-9987-08-108-0 |location=Dar es Salaam, Tanzania |pages=241–246 |language=en |chapter=Music and Politics in Tanzania: a case study of Nyota-wa-Cigogo}}</ref> and the wider Swahilisphere. It has been influenced by the musical traditions of the African Great Lakes, North Africa, the Middle East, and the Indian subcontinent. Taarab rose to prominence in 1928 with the advent of the genre's first star, Siti binti Saad.<ref name="Mgana_91">{{cite book |last1=Mgana |first1=Issa |title=Jukwaa la Taarab - Zanzibar |date=1991 |publisher=Mediafrica Books |location=Helsinki |isbn=978-9529675005 |page=101 |language=sw}}</ref><ref name="Askew_02">{{Cite book |last=Askew |first=Kelly |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=i7riV5SvDe8C |title=Performing the Nation: Swahili Music and Cultural Politics in Tanzania |publisher=University of Chicago Press |year=2002 |isbn=978-0-226-02981-8 |location=Chicago |pages=27–67, 276 |language=en}}</ref>
According to local legend, taarab was popularized by Sultan Seyyid Barghash bin Said (1870-1888).<ref name="Fargion_02">{{cite journal |last1=Fargion |first1=Janet T. |author2=Le Guennec-Coppens, Françoise |author3=Mery, Sophie |title=The Music of Zenj: Arab-African crossovers in the music of Zanzibar |journal=Journal des Africanistes |date=2002 |volume=72 |issue=2 |pages=203–212 |doi=10.3406/jafr.2002.1315 |url=https://www.persee.fr/doc/jafr_0399-0346_2002_num_72_2_1315 |location=Paris |language=fr}}</ref> He enjoyed luxury and the pleasures of life. It was this ruler who initiated taarab in Zanzibar; and later it spread all over the African Great Lakes region. The sultan imported a tarab ensemble from Egypt to play in his Beit el-Ajab palace. He subsequently decided to send Mohamed Ibrahim from Zanzibar to Egypt to learn music and to play the kanun, a string instrument similar to the zither. Upon his return, he formed the Zanzibar Taarab Orchestra. In 1905, Zanzibar's second music society, Ikwhani Safaa Musical Club, was established, which continues to thrive in the 21st century. Ikwhani Safaa and Culture Musical Club, were founded in 1958, have been the leading Zanzibar taarab orchestras.<ref name="Indian Ocean">{{Cite web |title=Swahili Taarab - Music of the Indian Ocean |url=https://sites.google.com/site/musicoftheindianocean/reading-units/swahili-taarab-pt-i-the-birth-of-swahili-taarab |access-date=2020-05-28 |website=sites.google.com}}</ref>
==Etymology== The word ''taarab'' is a loanword from Arabic. The Arabic word tarab ({{lang|ar|طرب}}) means "having pleasure, delight with music".<ref name="Stone_08">{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XEeTAgAAQBAJ |title=The Garland Handbook of African Music |publisher=Routledge |year=2008 |isbn=9781135900014 |editor-last=Stone |editor-first=Ruth M. |location=New York |pages=14, 46–50, 136–137 |language=en}}</ref><ref>Mohamed El-Mohammady Rizk, ''Women in Taarab: The Performing Art in East Africa''. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2007.</ref>
== History of taarab music == After the spreading of taarab from the Sultan's palace to Zanzibari weddings and other community events, the first famous female singer of ''taarab'' was Siti bint Saad.<ref name="Mgana_91" /><ref name="Stone_08" /> In 1928, she and her band became the first from the region to make commercial recordings as the first East African to be recorded in the Bombay His Master's Voice studios. She would become one of the most famous taarab musicians of all time.<ref name="Stone_08" />
Over the next several decades, bands and musicians like Bi Kidude, Mzee Yusuph, Culture Musical Club and Al-Watan Musical Club kept ''taarab'' at the forefront of the Tanzanian scene, and made inroads across the world. Playing in a similar style, smaller Kidumbak ensembles grew popular, at least among the poor of Zanzibar, featuring two small drums, bass, violins and dancers using claves and maracas.<ref>{{cite web | title=Music from Zanzibar | url=https://www.phoi.io/index.php/Articles/Display/Details/id/550 }}</ref>
The 1960s saw a group called the Black Star Musical Club from Tanga modernize the genre, bringing it to audiences farther afield, especially Burundi and Kenya. More recently, modern taarab bands like East African Melody have emerged, as have related backbiting songs for women, called mipasho.<ref name="Khamis_05">{{Cite journal |last=Khamis |first=Said A. M. |date=2005-12-07 |title=Clash of interests and conceptualisation of taarab in East Africa |url=https://eref.uni-bayreuth.de/23648/ |journal=Swahili Forum |volume=12 |issue=12 |pages=133–159 |issn=1614-2373}}</ref>
Taarab music is a fusion of Swahili poetry sung in rhythmic poetic style, performed by male or female singers and taarab ensembles comprising numerous musicians. Taarab forms a part of the social life of the Swahili people along the coastal areas, especially in Zanzibar, Tanga and even further in Mombasa and Malindi along the Kenya coast.<ref name="Askew_02" /><ref>https://muse.jhu.edu/book/118735</ref>
Wherever the Swahili-speaking people travelled, Taraab moved with them. It has penetrated as far inland as Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi in East Africa, where taarab groups compete in popularity with other kinds of popular musical groups.<ref name="Njogu_07" /> It spread to the Comoros, where it is known as ''twarab'', in the early 20th century and remains a major musical force there.<ref>{{cite web|last=Graebner |first=Werner |title=Comoros music: Mohamed Hassan and Twarab on Ngazidja |website=PHOI: Phonothèque Historique de l’Océan Indien |url=https://www.phoi.io/index.php/Articles/Display/Details/id/544 |date=5 July 2023 |access-date=15 January 2026 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://archive.today/20260117171914/https://www.phoi.io/index.php/Articles/Display/Details/id/544 |archive-date=17 January 2026}}</ref>
In the early 21st century a taarab revolution has been taking place and much debate continues about the music which has been changed by the East African ''Melody'' phenomenon. Melody, as they are known by their mostly female fans, play modern taarab, which is 'taarab to dance to' and features direct lyrics, bypassing the lyrical subtlety of the older songs, where the meaning of the lyrics is only alluded to, and never directly inferred.<ref name="Njogu_07" /> Today, taarab songs may be explicit – sometimes even graphic – in sexual connotation, and much of the music of groups like ''Melody'' and ''Muungano'' is composed and played on keyboards, increasing portability for different venues. Also, the groups are much smaller in number than traditional taarab orchestras and therefore more readily available to tour and play shows throughout the region and beyond.<ref name="Edmondson_07" /> Tanzanians' are still developing this kind of music. Mzee Yusuph, the band leader of Jahazi Modern Taarab, is termed as the king of modern taarab.
There is also a sub genre of Swahili taarab music called Indian taarab or taarab ya kihindi that features Swahili words set to Hindi film melodies and performed in a peculiar Indian style.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Eisenberg |first=Andrew J. |date=2017-08-01 |title=The Swahili Art of Indian Taarab |url=https://read.dukeupress.edu/cssaame/article/37/2/336/129464/The-Swahili-Art-of-Indian-TaarabA-Poetics-of |journal=Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East |language=en |volume=37 |issue=2 |pages=336–354 |doi=10.1215/1089201x-4133978 |issn=1089-201X|url-access=subscription }}</ref>
==See also== * Music of Tanzania * Tarab
== Further reading ==
* {{Cite book |last=Graebner |first=Werner |author-link=Werner Graebner |url=https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/9781000183641 |title=Island Musics |date=2020-05-26 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-003-08575-1 |editor-last=Dawe |editor-first=Kevin |edition=1 |language=en |doi=10.4324/9781003085751}} * {{Cite book |last=Graebner |first=Werner |title=Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Popular Music of the World: Locations: Africa and the Middle East |url=https://www.bloomsburymusicandsound.com/encyclopedia-chapter?docid=b-9781501342059&tocid=b-9781501342059-ch14130-ch-3334-sec-1&st= |date=2016 |publisher=Continuum |isbn=978-1-5013-2918-0 |editor-last=Shepherd |editor-first=John |chapter=Tanzania, Zanzibar, Comoros, Taarab |doi=10.5040/9781501329180-0000456 |editor-last2=Horn |editor-first2=David |editor-last3=Laing |editor-first3=Dave}} * {{Cite book |last=Askew |first=Kelly |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gNSxyGOO_HIC |title=Performing the Nation: Swahili Music and Cultural Politics in Tanzania |date=2002-07-28 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |isbn=978-0-226-02981-8 |language=en}} * {{Cite book |last=Edmondson |first=Laura |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BWtQAAAAMAAJ |title=Performance and Politics in Tanzania: The Nation on Stage |date=2007-07-20 |publisher=Indiana University Press |isbn=978-0-253-11705-2 |language=en}} * {{Cite book |last1=Njogu |first1=Kimani |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=g6efAAAAMAAJ |title=Songs and Politics in Eastern Africa |last2=Maupeu |first2=Herv |date=2007-10-15 |publisher=African Books Collective |isbn=978-9987-08-108-0 |language=en}}
==Sources== {{Reflist}}
==External links==
* {{citation|author=Jean Ngoya Kidula |date=2018-10-01 |doi=10.5406/ethnomusicology.62.3.0512 |issn=0014-1836 |issue=3 |pages=512–514 |periodical=Ethnomusicology |title=Poetry in Motion: 100 Years of Zanzibar's Nadi Ikhwan Safaa / Poésie en mouvement: 100 ans de Nadi Ikhwan Safaa de Zanzibar |url=https://scholarlypublishingcollective.org/uip/etm/article-abstract/62/3/512/234912/Poetry-in-Motion-100-Years-of-Zanzibar-s-Nadi?redirectedFrom=fulltext |volume=62|url-access=subscription }}<!-- auto-translated from German by Module:CS1 translator --> (Review of the dokumentary ''Poetry in Motion: 100 Years of Zanzibar's Nadi Ikhwan Safaa. '' Directed by Ron Mulvihill. Produced by Kelly Askew and Werner Graebner. DVD. 2016.)
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7L-KynQfdk Video from ''Poetry in Motion: 100 Years of Zanzibar's Nadi Ikhwan Safaa''] at YouTube
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20070323193903/http://zanzibar.net/zanzibar/zanzibar_music_taarab Website about influences on taarab and instruments in taarab]
{{Genres of African popular music}} {{Music of Africa}} {{Authority control}}
Category:Culture of Zanzibar Category:Kenyan styles of music Category:Tanzanian styles of music Category:African music genres