Classroom lesson 路 Afrobeats馃嚦馃嚞 Nigeria

Afrobeats - music made in Lagos, heard everywhere

Started in Nigeria, now one of the world's biggest music styles

The Nigerian musician Burna Boy performing on stage

Photo 路 Wikimedia Commons

What is it?

Afrobeats is a style of music that started in Nigerian cities, especially Lagos, in the 2010s. It mixes traditional African drums with hip-hop, dance music and Caribbean rhythms. Today it is played on the radio all over the world.

Tell me more

Afrobeats is built around the drum. Underneath the singing and the keyboards, you'll almost always hear fast, bouncy drum patterns from West African music traditions like Yoruba talking drums and Highlife. That drum is what makes you want to dance.

Some of the biggest stars in Afrobeats are Nigerian. Burna Boy and Wizkid have both won Grammy awards. Tems has sung with Beyonc茅. Davido fills stadiums all over the world. Their songs are streamed billions of times - songs that started in a studio in Lagos.

The word 'Afrobeats' (with an 's') is sometimes confused with the older 'Afrobeat' (no 's'), which was invented by a Nigerian musician called Fela Kuti in the 1970s. The new style took some of the spirit of the old one and mixed it with newer sounds from around the world.

What makes Afrobeats special is how it mixes languages. A song might switch between English, Yoruba, Igbo and Nigerian Pidgin (a fun mixed-up English used across Nigeria) all in one verse. The whole world can sing along, even if they don't understand every word - because the rhythm is what carries the song.

In the classroom

Walk your class through this in 15 minutes.

Talk together

Discussion prompts

  1. 01How do you know straight away when a song is going to make you want to dance?
  2. 02Why do you think some songs travel around the whole world while others stay close to home?
  3. 03What's a kind of music your family loves? Where did it come from?
Try this

Classroom activity

As a class, listen to a clip of a famous Afrobeats song (e.g. 'Last Last' by Burna Boy or 'Essence' by Wizkid). Clap along to the drum pattern. Then try and clap a different pattern of your own. Discuss: what makes a beat 'feel good'?