Youssou N'Dour is a Senegalese singer, songwriter, musician, composer, occasional actor, businessman, and politician. In 2004, Rolling Stone described him as, "perhaps the most famous singer alive" in Senegal and much of Africa and in 2023, the same publication ranked him at number 69 on its list of the 200 Greatest Singers of All Time. From April 2012 to September 2013, he was Senegal's Minister of Tourism.
Senegal's music is best known abroad due to the popularity of mbalax, a development of conservative music from different ethnic groups and sabar drumming popularized internationally by Youssou N'Dour.
The music of Mali is, like that of most West African nations, ethnically diverse, but one influence predominates: that of the ancient Mali Empire of the Mandinka. Mande people make up around 50% of Mali's population; other ethnic groups include the Fula (17%), Gur-speakers 12%, Songhai people (6%), Tuareg and Moors (10%).
A griot is a West African historian, storyteller, praise singer, poet, and/or musician.
The music of the Gambia is closely linked musically with that of its neighbor, Senegal, which surrounds its inland frontiers completely. Among its prominent musicians is Foday Musa Suso. Mbalax is a widely known popular dance music of the Gambia and neighbouring Senegal. It fuses popular Western music and dance, with sabar, the traditional drumming and dance music of the Wolof and Serer people.
Xalam is a traditional lute from West Africa with 1 to 5 strings. The xalam is commonly played in Mali, Gambia, Senegal, Niger, Northern Nigeria, Northern Ghana, Burkina Faso, Mauritania, and Western Sahara. The xalam and its variants are known by various names in other languages, including bappe, diassare, hoddu (Pulaar), koliko (Gurunsi), kologo (Frafra), komsa, kontigi, gurmi, garaya (Hausa), koni, konting (Mandinka), molo (Songhay/Zarma), ndere, ngoni (Bambara), and tidinit.
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.
The music of West Africa has a significant history, and its varied sounds reflect the wide range of influences from the area's regions and historical periods.
Doudou Ndiaye Rose was a Senegalese drummer, composer and band leader, and was the recognized modern master of Senegal's traditional drum, the sabar. He was the father of a musical dynasty that includes some of the most successful traditional musicians of contemporary West Africa. He was one of the first musicians to bring Senegalese traditional music to the attention of the world.
The talking drum is an hourglass-shaped drum from West Africa, whose pitch can be regulated to mimic the tone and prosody of human speech. It has two drumheads connected by leather tension cords, which allow the player to change the pitch of the drum by scraping the cords between their arm and body.
Mbalax is the urban dance music of Senegal, Mauritania and the Gambia. The musical style is rooted in the indigenous instrumental and vocal styles accompanied by polyrhythmic sabar drumming of the Wolof, a social identity that includes both the original Wolof people of the Greater Senegambia region and the urban panethnic identity that arose during colonialism. A cultural value proved by Wolof is their one's and respect of other cultural and musical practices. Therefore the origins of mbalax include a fusion of Wolof, Soce, and Serer music, rhythms, and instrumentation. The Wolof ability to include the diverse styles from Senegambian groups has allowed the sabar and its modern music formation to thrive. It is not uncommon, for example, for a sabar event to include music of the Serer such as the njuup, which is connected to sacred ndut rite ceremonies. In this way many ethnic groups may participate and the inclusion also increases the accessibilyt and popularity of the genre. In the 1970s, mbalax arose as Senegalese fused indigenous music styles with urban dance music from the African diaspora, the West, and the continent. These foreign sounds included U.S. soul, jazz, and salsa. Afro Cuban musics from the diaspora, Congolese rumba, and rock were also fused with the rhythms of sabar that were now played on the electric bass, guitar and keyboards.
The sabar is a traditional drum from Senegal that is also played in the Gambia. It is associated with Wolof and Serer people.
Mbaye Dieye Faye is a Senegalese singer and percussionist.
Alioune Palla Mbaye dit « Nder » is a Senegalese singer. Nder takes his name from the n'der, the drum favoured by his griot father.
Daniel Laemouahuma Jatta is a Jola scholar and musician from Mandinary, Gambia, who pioneered the research and documentation of the akonting, a Jola folk lute, as well as the related Manjago folk lute, the buchundu, in the mid-1980s. Prior to Jatta's work, these instruments were largely unknown outside the rural villages of the Senegambia region of West Africa.
MAMADOU is a Senegalese music band. Originally called "Mamadou Diop and the Jolole Band", the group was founded in early 1998, later simplifying their name to "MAMADOU" in late 2000.
The Serer people are a West African ethnoreligious group. They are the third-largest ethnic group in Senegal, making up 15% of the Senegalese population. They also reside in northern Gambia and southern Mauritania.
Senegalese wrestling is a type of folk wrestling traditionally performed by several African tribes, from the Wolofs of West Africa to the Nuer and Dinka of South Sudan. and now a national sport in Senegal and parts of The Gambia, and is part of a larger West African form of traditional wrestling. The Senegalese form traditionally allows blows with the hands (frappe), the only one of the West African traditions to do so. As a larger confederation and championship around Lutte Traditionnelle has developed since the 1990s, Senegalese fighters now practice both forms, called officially Lutte Traditionnelle sans frappe and Lutte Traditionnelle avec frappe for the striking version.
Senegalese literature is written or literary work which has been produced by writers born in the West African state. Senegalese literary works are mostly written in French, the language of the colonial administration. However, there are many instances of works being written in Arabic and the native languages of Wolof, Pulaar, Mandinka, Diola, Soninke and Serer. Oral traditions, in the form of Griot storytellers, constitute a historical element of the Senegalese canon and have persisted as cultural custodians throughout the nation's history. A form of proto-Senegalese literature arose during the mid 19th century with the works of David Abbé Boilat, who produced written ethnographic literature which supported French Colonial rule. This genre of Senegalese literature continued to expand during the 1920s with the works of Bakary Diallo and Ahmadou Mapaté Diagne. Earlier literary examples exist in the form of Qur’anic texts which led to the growth of a form African linguistic expressionism using the Arabic alphabet, known as Ajami. Poets of this genre include Ahmad Ayan Sih and Dhu al-nun.
The Njuup tradition is a Serer style of music rooted in the Ndut initiation rite, which is a rite of passage that young Serers must go through once in their lifetime as commanded in the Serer religion.
