The People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola, from 1977–1990 called the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola – Labour Party, is an Angolan social democratic political party. The MPLA fought against the Portuguese Army in the Angolan War of Independence from 1961 to 1974, and defeated the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) and the National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA) in the Angolan Civil War. The party has ruled Angola since the country's independence from Portugal in 1975, being the de facto government throughout the civil war and continuing to rule afterwards.
The music of Angola has been shaped both by wider musical trends and by the political history of the country. while Angolan music has also influenced the music of the other Lusophone countries and Latin American countries. In turn, the music of Angola was instrumental in creating and reinforcing "angolanidade", the Angolan national identity. The capital and largest city of Angola — Luanda — is home to a diverse group of styles including kazukuta, semba, kizomba and kuduro. Just off the coast of Luanda is Ilha do Cabo, home to an accordion and harmonica-based style of music called rebita.
The National Front for the Liberation of Angola is a political party and former militant organisation that fought for Angolan independence from Portugal in the war of independence, under the leadership of Holden Roberto.
The Angolan War of Independence, known as the Armed Struggle of National Liberation in Angola, was a war of independence fought between the Angolan nationalist forces of the MPLA, UNITA and FNLA, and Portugal. It began as an uprising by Angolans against the Portuguese imposition of forced cultivation of only cotton as a commodity crop. As the resistance spread against colonial authorities, multiple factions developed that struggled for control of Portugal's overseas province of Angola. There were three nationalist movements and also a separatist movement.
José Adelino Barceló de Carvalho, better known as Bonga, is an Angolan folk and semba singer-songwriter. He was born in Kipiri in Luanda in 1942.
Maria de Lourdes Pereira dos Santos Van-Dúnem was an Angolan singer. Usually called Lourdes Van-Dúnem, she was born in Luanda, and rose to stardom in the 1960s with the group Ngola Ritmos. She recorded her first album, Monami, with this group. She toured several times in Portugal, Algeria, and Brazil, in addition to performances in Angola. After her first album, most of her career was spent with the group Jovens do Prenda.
Ngola Ritmos was a musical group created in 1947 in the home of Manuel dos Passos by a group of young men called Domingos Van-Dúnem, Mário da Silva Araújo, Francisco Machado, Liceu Vieira Dias and Nino Ndongo who formerly comprised a group named "Os Sambas". They sang in kimbundu with the purpose to spread and divulge cultural and political awareness to the peoples of Luanda during the Portuguese Empire era. They felt a need to create something new. To spread and divulge folkloric themes that were fading away due to colonialism so Ngola Ritmos, still a small group, appeared with Liceu Vieira Días as the main guitar player and the rest playing with drums and acacia sticks as rattles.
Angolanidade is the national identity of Angola. It can also be described as Angolan cultural patriotism. Much of what is today considered angolanidade was created by Angolan intellectuals as a conscious effort to highlight an idealized vision for what it means to be Angolan.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Luanda, Angola.
Rebita is a traditional music and dance from Angola. It is a genre of music and dance in which a circle of couples, led by a coordinator in the middle, dance in a traditional movement called Massemba.
Deolinda Rodrigues Francisco de Almeida was an Angolan revolutionary, writer, and poet. She was a member of the Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola and, in addition to seeing combat, worked for the organisation as a translator, educator, and radio host.
The Organization of Angolan Women is a political organisation in Angola, which was founded in 1962 to target women to support the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola. It was co-founded by Deolinda Rodrigues Francisco de Almeida.
David Gabriel José Ferreira was an Angolan musician, composer and activist. He began his singing career while Angola was still under the rule of the Portuguese Empire and his music often expressed left-wing and anti-colonialist sentiments. David Zé, along with Artur Nunes, Urbano de Castro and others, was a part of a group of musicians called the FAPLA-Povo Alliance who had the role to spread social and political awareness to Angolan citizens to start a laborist movement to reform Angola after its revolution. He was given the official position of Director of Music in the Culture Ministry in the incoming MPLA regime.
Os Kiezos is the name of a musical ensemble (conjunto) that emerged in 1963 in Marçal, a neighbourhood of Luanda. Known particularly within the genre of semba and Latin music like merengue, rumba and bolero. Os Kiezos are considered to be one of the most influential musical groups from Angola.
Analog Africa is a reissue record label based in Frankfurt, established in 2006 by DJ Samy Ben Redjeb.
Congo Funk! Sound Madness from the Shores of the Mighty Congo River is a compilation album of Congolese rumba, released by record label Analog Africa on 5 April 2024.
Azerbaijani Gitara is a series of compilation albums released by Swiss label Bongo Joe. The albums compile music in the genre of Azerbaijani gitara, which was first developed in the 1960s as Azerbaijani musicians like Rafiq Hüseynov fused traditional genres such as mugham with western styles on Czech Jolana guitars. The first volume (2020) compiles music by Rüstəm Quliyev, a native of Nagorno-Karabakh who remains popular in Azerbaijan thanks to the YouTube channel run by his nephew. The second volume (2024) compiles music by Rəhman Məmmədli, one of the first players to replicate traditional vocals with heavy distortion on the electric guitar.
Souvenirs is an album by Ethiopian musician Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guèbrou. Emahoy distributed the tracks on Souvenirs on homemade CD-Rs during her lifetime, and the album was compiled and posthumously reissued by US label Mississippi Records in February 2024. It is unique among Emahoy's albums for prominently featuring her vocals, sung in Amharic.
Groupe RTD are the in-house band of Radio Television of Djibouti, the state-owned national broadcaster of Djibouti. In their role as national band, Groupe RTD perform for visiting dignitaries and at Djiboutian presidential ceremonies. Their debut commercial album The Dancing Devils of Djibouti was recorded in 3 days in 2019, and released internationally in June 2020 on Ostinato Records, making it the first international album release from Djibouti.
Synthesizing the Silk Roads: Uzbek Disco, Tajik Folktronica, Uyghur Rock & Tatar Jazz from 1980s Soviet Central Asia is a compilation album of tracks recorded in Tashkent, Uzbek SSR from the mid-1970s to the early 1990s. The records on Synthesizing the Silk Roads were pressed at a factory owned by the Soviet state-run record label Melodiya. The album was released by US label Ostinato Records on 30 August 2024.
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