Soul and jazz Music of South Africa

The late 60s saw the emergence of soul music from the United States. Singers such as Percy Sledge and Wilson Pickett were particularly renowned, and it encouraged the South African artists to enter the area with an organ, a bass-and-drum beat part and an electric guitar.

source of picture: www.okayafrica.com

Also, during the 60s, jazz divided into two fields. Renowned dance ensembles like Elite Swingsters were well-known, while avant-garde jazz encouraged by the composition of John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins and Thelonious were also popular. In the later filed of artists comprised notable activists and thinkers, which include Abduallah Ibrahim (who is formerly called Dollar Brand), Hugh Masekela, Johnny Dyani, Chris McGregor, Kippie Moeketsi, Jonas Gwangwa and Sathima Bea Benjamin. In the year 1959, an American pianist known as John Mehegan organized a recording unit using many of the most notable South African jazz artists, resulting in the first two African jazz LPs. The coming year saw the Cold Castle National Jazz Festival, which introduced additional interest to South African jazz. Cold Castle became a yearly occasion for a few years, and introduced more artists, particularly Dudu Pukwana, Chris McGregor and Gideon Nxumalo. The year 1963 festival produced a LP known as Jazz the African Sound, but which the oppression of the government ended the jazz scene soon. Again, many artists moved or went into exile in the United Kingdom and many other countries.

Nevertheless, the African Jazz of the north of South African was being popularized in Johannesburg and the artists in Cape Town were developing to their jazz tradition. The port city had a long record of musical collaboration with seafaring players. Emerge of the Coon carnival and the visionary talent of Abdullah Ibrahim (also known as Dollar Brand) and his sax players, such as Robbie Jansen and Bassil Coetzee dominated the Cape Jazz. This was an improvised form of their traditional songs with musical references to European and American jazz which after 20 year becoming South African most popular jazz export.