ESWATINI: MUSIC AND DANCE

The traditional music of ethnic Swazis and Eswatini share many similarities to nearby South Africa. They also share some regional similarities with the southern part of Africa in general.

Instruments that are commonly used in music here include the calabash (a stringed instrument originally made from a gourd), rattles made from a number of materials, kudu horns (a kudu is like an antelope), reed flutes, the makeyana (a single-stringed bowed instrument mostly played by women).

There are two prominent festivals that take place in Eswatini: Incwala and Umhlanga. Incwala is a festival for the king that takes place during Summer Equinox (in December for them). The whole festival takes about a month, starting with small activities that culminate into a grand affair. Umhlanga is an eight-day long event that is centered around the unmarried, childless girls and women where they perform the Reed Dance. This dance has been the center of some discussion in recent decades as to whether it’s demeaning to parade the girls around in their short skirts and their bare breasts on display, or whether it’s merely a tie to their ethnic heritage and past. And actually, Google used to have videos of the Reed Dance marked as age-restricted due to naked breasts (gasp!), but there were so many protests about this since it’s part of their cultural practice and they lifted the restriction.

Music today has expanded to include pop, rock, folk music, and hip-hop. I did find a few artists on YouTube. The first one I really listened to was Sands. I saw a video from the Bushfire festival, and I watched a little bit of him performing. The song I listened to was kind of a rock ballad of sorts. I kind of liked it. He’s probably one of the biggest musicians to make it in Eswatini and put them on the map.

Sands

I did come across another hip-hop musician mentioned call KrTC (“courtesy”) of Hip-Hop. I wasn’t really able to find a video of him rapping by himself, just several videos of him doing spoken word, which is just as cool.

Bholoja

Another musician I listened to is Bholoja. He’s more of a jazz/acoustic musician; he’s a guitarist himself. The songs I’ve heard are pretty chill and relaxing. I enjoyed it. But he also utilizes traditional African instruments like the mbira (like a thumb piano - which I own one of!) and the sitolotolo (a mouth harp).

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