French hip hop or French rap, is the hip hop music style developed in French-speaking countries. France is the second largest hip-hop market in the world after the United States.
German hip hop refers to hip hop music produced in Germany. Elements of American hip hop culture, such as graffiti art and breakdancing, diffused into Western Europe in the early 1980s.
The Swiss hip hop culture began in the early 1980s.
Japanese hip hop is hip hop music from Japan. It is said to have begun when Hiroshi Fujiwara returned to Japan and started playing hip hop records in the early 1980s. Japanese hip hop tends to be most directly influenced by old school hip hop, taking from the era's catchy beats, dance culture and overall fun and carefree nature and incorporating it into their music. As a result, hip hop stands as one of the most commercially viable mainstream music genres in Japan and the line between it and pop music is frequently blurred.
The United States' multi-ethnic population is reflected through a diverse array of styles of music. It is a mixture of music influenced by the music of Europe, Indigenous peoples, West Africa, Latin America, Middle East, North Africa, amongst many other places. The country's most internationally renowned genres are jazz, blues, country, bluegrass, rock, rock and roll, R&B, pop, hip-hop/rap, soul, funk, religious, disco, house, techno, ragtime, doo-wop, folk, americana, boogaloo, tejano, surf, and salsa, amongst many others. American music is heard around the world. Since the beginning of the 20th century, some forms of American popular music have gained a near global audience.
Hip hop music has been popular in Africa since the early 1980s due to widespread African American influence. In 1985, hip hop reached Senegal, a French-speaking country in West Africa. Some of the first Senegalese rappers were Munyaradzi Nhidza Lida, M.C. Solaar, and Positive Black Soul.
Congolese music is one of the most influential music forms of the African continent. Since the 1930s, Congolese musicians have had a huge impact on the African musical scene and elsewhere. Many contemporary genres of music, such as Kenyan Benga and Colombian Champeta, have been heavily influenced by Congolese music. In 2021, Congolese rumba joined other living traditions such as Jamaican reggae music and Cuban rumba on UNESCO's "intangible cultural heritage of humanity" list.
The music of Belgium is a cultural mix where Flemish Dutch-speaking and Walloon French-speaking traditions mix with those of German minorities and of immigrant communities from Democratic Republic of the Congo or other distant countries.
The music of Malawi has historically been influenced by its triple cultural heritage of British, African, and American music. Malawians, known for their history as travellers and migrant workers, have contributed to the spread of their music across the African continent, blending it with various musical forms. A significant factor in this musical amalgamation was World War II, during which soldiers transported music to distant lands and brought it back, leading to the popularity of guitar and banjo duos as dance bands by the war's end. Both instruments were imported. Additionally, Malawians working in mines in South Africa and Mozambique influenced the fusion of music styles, giving rise to genres such as Kwela.
Lubumbashi is the second-largest city in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, located in the country's southeasternmost part, along the border with Zambia. The capital and principal city of the Haut-Katanga Province, Lubumbashi is the center of mining in the region, acting as a hub for many of the country's largest mining companies. No definite population figures are available, but the population of the city's urban area is estimated to be around 2,584,000 in 2021.
The Republic of the Congo is an African nation with close musical ties to its neighbor, the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The Democratic Republic of the Congo's homegrown pop music, soukous, is popular across the border, and musicians from both countries have fluidly travelled throughout the region playing similarly styled music, including Nino Malapet and Jean Serge Essous. Brazzaville had a major music scene until unrest in the late 1990s, and produced popular bands like Extra Musica and Bantous de la Capitale that played an integral role in the development of soukous and other styles of Congolese popular music. The Hip-Hop group "Bisso na Bisso" also hails from Congo-Brazzaville.
Senegalese hip hop is a form of hip hop that originated in Senegal in the early 1980s. When hip hop first hit the scene in Africa, it went from merely being a fad, to a more social and political movement. Amongst the most influential leaders of this movement were artists from the country of Senegal. With the modernization of the country, and the rise in media, the youth of Senegal were able to embrace a new form of expression.
Tanzanian Hip-hop, which is sometimes referred to Bongo Flava by many outside of Tanzania's hip hop community, encompasses a large variety of different sounds, but it is particularly known for heavy synth riffs and an incorporation of Tanzanian pop.
Russian hip hop refers to hip hop music recorded in Russia or in the Russian language in former Soviet states such as Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan. Hits by Russian rappers are included in the soundtracks of some PC-games and have formed part of several popular internet memes.
European hip hop refers to hip hop music and culture originating from Europe. Emerging in the 1980s following the genre's popularity in the United States, European hip hop has evolved into a diverse and influential musical movement. It encompasses a wide range of styles and subgenres, reflecting the continent's varied cultural landscapes and the experiences of both ethnic nationals and immigrant communities. Notable regional scenes include British hip hop and grime, German hip hop featuring both ethnic German and Turkish artists, and French hip hop, which has undergone several distinct eras of development. Other countries such as the Netherlands, Italy, Poland, and Romania have also produced significant hip hop scenes, each with its own unique characteristics and prominent artists.
Asian hip hop is a heterogeneous musical genre that covers all hip hop music as recorded and produced by artists of Asian origin.
Zap Mama is a Belgian singer-songwriter, performer, composer, lyricist, activist, video artist and ethno-vocal therapist born in the Democratic Republic of Congo, raised in Belgium. Zap Mama sings polyphonic and afro-pop music, a harmonic music with a mixture of infused African vocal techniques, urban, hip hop with emphasis on voice. In order to explore and discover the vast world of oral tradition music, she travels throughout Africa, learning, exchanging and sharing information about healing songs, lullabies, mourning, and practising polyphony with griots (bards), Tartit tuareg women, Dogons, Peulhs, Pygmies, Mangbetus, Zulus and others.
The Gambian hip hop scene is a relatively new scene in African hip hop which developed in the mid-1990s and was heavily influenced by American hip hop and Senegalese hip hop. Gambian hip-hop has been heavily influenced by international music scene including worldbeat, Senegalese wolof music, and American hip hop, as well as traditional Gambian mbalax and n'daga music. Dominican merengue and Jamaican reggae, ragga, and dancehall have also influenced the development of Gambian hip-hop.
Hip hop or hip-hop, formerly known as disco rap, is a genre of popular music that originated in the early 1970s from the African American community. Hip-hop music originated as an anti-drug and anti-violence genre consisting of stylized rhythmic music that often accompanies rapping, a rhythmic delivery of poetic speech. In the early 1990s, a professor of African American studies at Temple University said, "Hip-hop is something that blacks can unequivocally claim as their own." By the 21st century, the field of rappers had diversified by both race and gender. The music developed as part of the broader hip-hop culture, a subculture defined by four key stylistic elements: MCing/rapping, DJing/scratching with turntables, breakdancing, and graffiti art. While often used to refer solely to rapping and rap music, "hip hop" more properly denotes the practice of the entire subculture. The term hip hop music is sometimes used synonymously with the term rap music, though rapping is not a required component of hip hop music; the genre may also incorporate other elements of the culture, including DJing, turntablism, scratching, beatboxing, and instrumental tracks.
Baloji is a Belgian rapper, singer and film director of Congolese origin. Known as MC Balo in the hip hop group Starflam, he continued as solo artist starting 2006. The name Baloji in Swahili translates to "man of science". His film Omen was selected as the Belgian entry for Best International Feature Film at the 96th Academy Awards.
