what is world music?

World music is hard to categorise as it comes from so many different cultures. It is used a term that covers an enormous range of musical cultures.
The popularity of world music is a reaction to cultural imperialism from the west and in particular the music business.
World music is not new. In the 1920’s Latin American music, for example Tango from Argentina became a worldwide dance craze.
However from the 1950’s until the 1970’s music became dominated by Western pop. The music business took advantage of radio and TV. Records and cassettes became popular and it was more affordable.
But by the 1980’s people were getting fed up hearing the same sounds and commercialised music. They started to look for something different and found it in Africa, South America and Asia.
Now with the internet it’s possible to listen to an enormous range of music. Even if people can’t find world music in their record shops it is easy to download from the internet and listen to radio from across the world.
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