Will Ross reports from Zanzibar and Mombasa on how traditional Taarab music is responding to the challenge of new influences. In the 1930's the great Taarab singer, Siti Bint Saad, was a prized ...

When Zanzibar-born Taarab icon Fatuma binti Baraka alias Bi Kidude passed on at a golden age of 102 in April 2013, all eyes were on the genre’s rising stars, emblems of the music’s future.

Unlike the 12-piece acoustic taarab ensembles we'll be experiencing in Zanzibar, modern taarab takes a stripped-down approach--keyboard, drum machine, bass, and a rotating lineup of dynamic vocalists.

These veterans retained Taarab’s signature tune, melody, and songcraft, as it were since the Sultan of Zanzibar, brought bands from the Middle East to entertain him in the 1880s. Swahili lyrics ...

Unlike the 12-piece acoustic taarab ensembles we'll be experiencing in Zanzibar, modern taarab takes a stripped-down approach--keyboard, drum machine, bass, and a rotating lineup of dynamic vocalists.