Traditional music
Although there are many musical traditions in Botswana, two stand out for their importance. The first is the dithlaka. Practiced collectively, the genre sees each musician play a copper pipe possessing a single note. As a group, everyone plays their note at a different tempo, led by the muklaba, a kind of conductor who ensures the harmony of the ensemble. Dithlaka sizes and arrangement styles vary from village to village.
Botswana's other emblematic traditional music is Tswana. Ceremonial, dense and intense, Tswana music can be recognized by its symmetrical bars, unison singing and call-and-response format. Tswana music also features a number of instruments typical of the country, such as the segaba, a bowed string instrument, and the setinkane, a lamellophone, a kind of thumb piano similar to the mbira. On the percussion side, you can hear the moropa, a drum, the lepapata, an antelope horn, or the claps used as rhythmic accompaniment. Some of the country's most famous bands - such as Culture Spears and Matsieng - have played (or been inspired by) Tswana music and are well worth a listen.
Although it has always been popular, traditional music has seen two peaks in Botswana: the first in the late 1960s, when public radio carried out a vast project to collect traditional sounds from all the country's villages before broadcasting them every Sunday morning. The second peak occurred between 2005 and 2010, when Botswana's music industry began to take shape and really take off. During this period, traditional music entered a new golden age, being massively commercialized and given a prominent place on the country's radio stations.
A much-anticipated event for fans of Botswanan music is the Maitisong. Held every year for ten days at the Gaborone Theatre, this festival gives numerous local and African troupes the opportunity to perform under the best possible conditions.
The rock
With the popularity of the American music channel MTV and the development of the Internet, Botswana has developed a strong and dynamic rock scene. It's a little-known fact that the country even loves heavy metal, and has even cultivated a few stars of the genre, such as pioneers Metal Horizon (which saw the light of day in 1993) and Wrust. The latter, a band from the 2000s, has made quite a following among young people, finding in its death metal the ideal vehicle for rebelling against the established order. Wrust paved the way for such now-famous bands as Crackdust, with their particularly aggressive style, and Overthrust, renowned for their performances and stage attire (full black leather, bandanas, belts, cowboy hats, etc.). The latter band organizes the famous Winter Metal Mania Fest in Ghanzi, the country's biggest gathering of metal fans.
Jazz
Like its South African neighbor, jazz is an essential aesthetic in Botswana. In fact, "South African" jazz is a bigger influence here than the American standard, a peculiarity that can be explained not only by the geographical proximity of the two countries but also by the presence, in the past, of pioneers such as Hugh Masekela. Forced into exile by the apartheid regime, this legendary South African jazzman found Botswana to be his heartland, where he had a lasting influence on the local scene. This can be heard in the music of Socca Moruakgomo, Botswana's trumpet maestro, as well as in more recent artists such as the excellent pianist Bokani Dyer.
And let's not forget to mention gumba-gumba, a pure Botswana product that blends modernized Zulu and Tswana music with traditional jazz.
Current music
As in many other fields, Botswana's current music scene is nourished by South African and Congolese influences. From the former - in addition to jazz - Botswana has taken kwaito. This genre, which originated in the townships of Johannesburg in the 1990s, is the local cousin of hip-hop, a kind of slowed-down, bass-heavy, languorous house over which someone raps. Although it syncretizes a wide swath of South African musical history - the marabi of the 1920s, the kwela of the 1950s and Mbaqanga traditions - kwaito has largely conquered the hearts of Botswanans, developing a copious and prolific scene in the country. Local kwaito stars include Mapetla, Skazzo, Ghavorrou and P-Mag. While the genre may be in decline these days, each new album by its stars is greeted with the same fervor.
The other major trend in modern Botswana music is kwasa-kwasa. Originating in the Democratic Republic of Congo, this kind of slow rumba with a jerky, catchy rhythm is now deeply rooted in Botswana's musical landscape. It is embodied locally by stars such as Franco Lesokwane and his group Franco and Afro Musica, Alfredo Mos and Jeff Matheatau.
As nothing is lost and everything is transformed, some artists have fused kwaito and kwasa-kwasa to give birth to the aptly named "kwaito-kwasa". Typical of Botswana, this musical genre brings the faster, more insistent tempos of kwaito to the melodies and phrasing of kwasa-kwasa. The genre features a star whose fame extends beyond the country's borders: Vee Mampeezy (also known by his civilian name Odirile Ishmael Sento). Other artists in the genre, such as Slizer and Skeat, soon followed suit.
Botswana has not escaped the hip-hop wave, and has nurtured a well-established local scene. By the 1990s, the genre was already mainstream, and pioneers such as Cashless Society paved the way for several generations of artists such as local stars Scar and Kast, renowned for the quality of their songwriting. The country is also home to its own variant of hip-hop, motswako, a mix of rap in local languages (Setswana, Sesotho, Zulu or Afrikaans, depending on the rapper's origin) and English. A number of artists and collectives, such as Zeus and HHP, have made a name for themselves in this field, attracting new audiences to hip-hop.
The dance
Here, too, it all begins with the San people. For them, dance is ritual. In the past, it was used to heal, or to celebrate a successful hunt or a happy event around the fire. The dances are punctuated by the songs of the women and the famous clicks of the men, and each one tells a story. Intense dances, they generally lead to trance.
Another very common dance in Botswana is the borankana. Also known as phathisi, it is generally performed by the Bakwena tribe, traditionally by both older and younger people. Recognizable by the cords it requires to be worn on the legs, this dance is performed in a semicircle of two lines, to a rhythm set by whistles and clapping. The setapa, meanwhile, is a traditional dance of the Bangwaketse tribe (Kanye's village and surrounding areas) and sees a group of people stamping their feet to the rhythm of the song it accompanies. Made up of an equal mix of men and women, the troops usually wear brown shells on their feet, which make a sound as they dance. Another Botswana tradition, tsutsube, is a trance dance practiced by the San. Ndazola is another traditional dance of the Kalanga people.
While stumbling across a boma, a gathering of village members, is one of the best opportunities to admire Botswana's dances and songs, there are a few events that provide an interesting overview of the field. Starting with the Kuru Dance Festival, Botswana's major cultural event, held annually since 1997. Bringing together hundreds of Khoïsan from all over Botswana - and sometimes even from Namibia and South Africa - the festival lasts two to three days and consists of numerous dances, games and traditional meals. Another major event, the Dithubaruba Cultural Festival, celebrates Bakwena culture in Ntsweng, in the Molepolole region. On the program: dances, songs, crafts and tasting of traditional dishes. In a similar spirit, the Mmakgodumo Heritage & Cultural Festival celebrates Ngwaketse culture in Kanye, with traditional cuisine, poetry, song and dance.
