Tsapiky () is a musical genre popular in southwest

Madagascar Madagascar, officially the Republic of Madagascar, is an island country that includes the island of Madagascar and numerous smaller peripheral islands. Lying off the southeastern coast of Africa, it is the world's List of islands by area, f ...

, particularly in the former

Toliara Province The Toliara Province (formerly Toliary or Tuléar) is a former province of Madagascar with an area of . It had a population of 2,229,550 (July, 2001). Its capital was Toliara. Near Toliara was the " spiny forest". Toliara Province bordered the foll ...

. It was created as a fusion between South African pop (originally picked up from Mozambican radio stations) and native Malagasy tradition in the 1970s. The music is characterized by its jerky rhythms and fast beat. The song sees popularity in the contexts of sports events, night clubs, balls, celebrations, and funerals. Common instruments in tsapiky include: guitar,

electric guitars Electric Guitars were an English band formed early in 1980 by Neil Davenport (vocals, lyrics) and Richard Hall (bass, vocals) who were both studying English at Bristol University. The band soon increased to a five-man line-up, with Andy Sander ...

, bass, drums,

accordions Accordions (from 19th-century German ', from '—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a reed in a frame). The ess ...

, synthesizers, and vocals (usually provided by a choir of women). Although initially consisting of solely acoustic instruments, in the 1980s, tsapiky also integrated electric guitars.

Festivals

Tsapiky festivals primarily occur in urban centers, such as

Toliara Toliara (also known as ''Toliary'', ; formerly ''Tuléar'') is a city in southern Madagascar. It is the capital of the Atsimo-Andrefana region, located 936 km southwest of the national capital Antananarivo. The current spelling of the name ...

. These festivals last for several days to a week, and consist of several concerts play for hours, supposedly inducing trance-like states from audience members. Typically, entire families come along, bearing gifts.

Festivals

References

See also and further reading