Decolonizing the African Musical Repertoire

In this episode, Dr. Sidra Lawrence, Associate Professor of Ethnomusicology and Director of the Afro-Caribbean Ensemble at BGSU, together with several members of BGSU's Afro-Caribbean Ensemble, share their experiences playing African and African diasporic music for an American audience. Both Sidra and the ensemble underline the complexity and sophistication of African and African diasporic music, arguing that it deserves as much study and attention as Western art music. The clips from their recordings included in this episode demonstrate the bandwidth of African music. As Sidra, Clayton and Theo eloquently argue, rethinking the African and Afro Diasporic music repertoire allows us to see its key contributions to US American and world culture, not as folklore, influence or inspiration, but as one of its main driving forces. Not surprisingly, the students who are part of the ensemble share how playing this repertoire has challenged them to improvise and explore and has furthered their training as musicians.