Musical diversity is the pulse of Africa

Most contemporary American listeners' ideas about African music solidified in the 1980s. Paul Simon's "Graceland" album introduced new fans to the sounds of the continent through collaborations with its stars, most notably the South African vocal group Ladysmith Black Mambazo. At the same time, major tours by the large ensembles led by Nigerian bandleaders King Sunny Ade and Fela Kuti dazzled audiences with spectacular stage shows.

Embraced by pop stars such as Simon, Gabriel and David Byrne, African music became a key lifestyle accessory for the liberal elite. That it also often served as the soundtrack to liberation movements, especially the South African struggle against apartheid, made loving this joyful music feel like a noble act.

"There's this old-school audience for African pop, this aging, liberal, NPR listener demo," said Banning Eyre, one of America's leading authorities on African music, in a recent phone call. (Eyre is senior editor for the website Afropop.org and often serves as a National Public Radio commentator.) "In general you see the major African stars and you see the same old crowd. But now, I've identified three or four fronts of new audiences for African music."

Those new fans, Eyre said, often discover African music through American transliterators. Matthews, who was born in South Africa, and the Mali-loving North Carolina band Toubab Krewe promote the music among jam rockers, who also have welcomed Mahlasela and K'Naan at the annual Bonnaroo festival. Afrobeat inheritors Antibalas and the Budos Band pay homage to Fela on the New York club scene. The much-buzzed-about Vampire Weekend is leading indie rockers back to Congolese and Senegalese styles. And in hip-hop, Akon's massive mainstream success, along with M.I.A.'s hipster adventures, might have primed ears for the emergence of K'Naan.

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World without borders

"I hear Akon and I'm like, I love you," said K'Naan when asked about the Senegalese-born pop star. "He's using all these melodies, all this tone of Senegal in pop music. I don't think he could have done it as a traditional African, because Akon is very African-looking, very dark. So he did it with sound -- with his nuance, with his melodies. And then he dressed up in a suit and told you about the club."

K'Naan's image is more forthrightly African. With a gently curling Afro and skin the color of well-steeped tea, he presents himself as casually elegant -- the quintessential African immigrant, blending in with the other black residents of his city but maintaining a difference too.