What Is World Music? Your Gateway to Global Sounds
What is world music? Beyond the problematic label lies a universe of authentic cultural sounds. Discover how to navigate global music traditions beyond algorithmic recommendations.
I still have the casette booklet. Dog-eared pages, notes in the margins about which instrument was which, trying to pronounce the musicians’ names correctly.
Streaming services have a “World Music” section. It’s usually a grab bag of “exotic” sounds curated by people who’ve never left their office.
That’s not world music. That’s tourism.
The Term Itself Is Complicated
Here’s the uncomfortable truth: “world music” was invented by Western record labels in the 1980s to market non-Western music to Western audiences. The term literally meant “everything that’s not us.”
Record store bins needed a label. So everything from Senegalese mbalax to Bulgarian vocal polyphony to Brazilian forró got shoved into one catch-all category. It was marketing, not musicology.
But we’re stuck with the term, and it’s evolved.
Today, “world music” means something more specific: music rooted in cultural traditions, using indigenous instruments, vocal techniques, and rhythmic structures that developed outside the Western pop-rock-classical framework.
The key word is rooted.
We’re not talking about Shakira’s crossover pop or Sting collaborating with Middle Eastern musicians for a world tour. We’re talking about music that grows directly from cultural soil—music that serves a function in its community, whether spiritual practice, social gathering, storytelling, or celebration.
