Dur-Dur Band Recordings (Awesome Tapes from Africa)

The Dur-Dur Band Recordings are a collection of classic Somalian music recorded in the 1980s. The recordings consist of music by the 1980s Mogadishu-based collective known as the Dur-Dur Band. Brian Simkowitz, the curator of Awesome Tapes From Africa (ATFA) said the recordings boast a Middle Eastern-musical quality with vocals that conjure the sounds of Southeast Asia. The recordings reflect how the way Somali musicians internalised and renegotiated American soul music and jazz.

Sanaag Samataliye, a Somali music historian, said that the 1980s, a time of relative economic stability and extreme political repression, was also one of the most innovative periods in the history of Somali music. Some of the most prominent bands of this time include Iftin, Waaberi Muqdisho, and Waaberi Hargeysa, among a host of others.
From the 1930s a growing number of artists started playing the rhythms, melodies and harmonies on ouds, violins, accordions and other instruments. In the process, they created new Somali genres like balwo and heello, which later cross-pollinated with music from neighboring countries.

From the 1950s through to the late 1990s, musicians developed their craft by delving deeper into local genres. Traditional instruments such as nasaro (high ritual drum), madhuube (thumb piano), fuugwo (trumpet) shareero (lute), muufe (horn) and seese (one-chord violin) were integrated with, and in some instances replaced by, the guitar, sax, keyboard and drums. This represented a turning point. Somali music expanded beyond the confines of traditional folk music to fusing with non-Somali genres such as maqam (Arabic), taarab (East African), jazz, funk, Afro-beat and reggae.