Genres

Mhondoro plays in several different popular genres from Zimbabwe. Most of these genres combine elements of indigenous music from Zimbabwe, especially dance styles performed throughout the Shona-speaking areas in the north, center, and east of the country. Zimbabwean popular music also reveals influences from South African popular music, Congolese rhumba, or soukous, and the fast kanindo, or benga, guitar music of the 1970s in Tanzania and Kenya.

Chimurenga is associated almost exclusively with the music of Thomas Mapfumo. The word itself refers to liberation struggle, particularly the war in the 1970s that led to Zimbabwe's independence. Chimurenga music, as performed by Mapfumo, draws heavily on mbira music and speaks to themes of liberation and ancestor-based spirituality. Although Mapfumo performs many songs that have no connection to Zimbabwe's mbira tradition, it is these songs for which he is most famous. Mhondoro performs several Mapfumo songs that are classic mbira-based chimurenga songs such as Hwa Hwa and Mhondoro. We also perform the Mapfumo songs Titambire, Kuvarira Mukati, Nyarara Mukadzi Wangu, and Ndiyani Waparadza Musha.

Jit is a very popular local genre that had its heyday in the 1980s. Based both on South African music and local styles of informal village drumming, jit is marked by fast guitar work, frequently includes a heavy bass, and is most commonly done in a fast 12/8 rhythm marked by incessant triplets. The Bhundu Boys are well-known for their fast jit style, although the two songs we perform by them, Chitaunyike and Manhenga, are less typical. The Oliver Mtukudzi song Dai Ndiine Mukoma could be classified as jit, but is slower, in four, and more reliant on South African musical characteristics. Kugarike Tange Nhamo, by Mtukudzi, combines Chimurenga elements of the mbira-based chord progression with the powerful bass and driving rhythm of jit. The Chibadura song Munhu Hana Chakanaka is a classic jit song, even though he is more famous as a sungura artist.

Sungura is currently the most popular guitar-band style in Zimbabwe. Frequently called museve, sungura draws on kanindo and soukous to produce a guitar-heavy style that is usually in four, has a simple chord progression and incorporates frequent changes in texture as the singer, lead guitar, rhythm guitars, and bass come in and out to emphasize the rhythmic relationships of the different parts. Although Mhondoro doesn't yet perform any classic sungura songs, Wapindwa Nei by Leonard Dembo draws on many of these characteristics.

Mbira isn't exactly a genre of popular music, but it has had such an influence on Zimbabwean popular music and on Mhondoro that I include it here. The mbira is a hand-held instrument with several metal keys that the player strikes with his or her index fingers and thumbs. Although there are several types in Zimbabwe, the most common in the capital of Harare and in Zimbabwe's popular music is commonly known as Chakwi, Nhare, mbira dzavadzimu, or mbira dzaVaZezuru. Mbira music is marked by its cyclical form, constant triplet feel, dense texture, high singing with yodelling, and the ubiquitous presence of the hosho, the loud gourd shakers found at every ceremonial and informal music event in the rural areas of Zimbabwe.

Mbira dzaVaNdau from Chipinge in Zimbabwe's Eastern Highlands is also cyclical and dense but sounds very different from the more well-known mbira from the interior of the country. Relying on a complex relationship between duple and triple feels and an unusual 6-note scale, the Ndau mbira is a unique instrument that rarely, if ever, has been played with guitars. Mhondoro's song Mufira Jeh is an mbira dzaVaNdau song based on a performance by the Mozambican mbira maestro Zombiyi Muzite Gwenzi.

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