Tom Simmert shares insights of his academic research and talks about »Dance Music Across The Atlantic«. He illustrates the musical exchange between Africa and north America with focus on Nigeria, the US and South Africa. With sound examples he shows how genres like Afro funk, Afro disco, kwaito, bubblegum and South African house developed and interfered with the global dance music scene.

From there, Dj Zhao will zoom out to a macro perspective and give us a birds' eye view of the Afro-rhythm-continuum, its mutation through various historical and material processes, and its central role in the shaping of modern dance music culture.

Tom Simmert

A musician and PhD fellow at the department for anthropology and African studies, University of Mainz. His academic work deals with contemporary popular music in Nigeria and South Africa.

dj zhao

Born in Beijing and based in Berlin, Dj Zhao is an anarcho-musicologist and rhythm ambassador bringing Marxist analysis to music theory, and a poly-cultural understanding of sound to his deeply percussive cross-genre sets. Not restricted by style or convention, Dj Zhao draws from wildly different times and places, connecting between the Global South and the West, acoustic and electronic, traditional and hyper-modern.

Subsequently: Robert Johnson: Hotel International with Bradley Zero, RAMZi, DJ Neewt