Ethio-Jazz and Mulatu Astatke

When I first heard this piece, I was both surprised and intrigued. The music distinctly sounds like Jazz – but at the same time, it doesn’t. I would later learn that Tezeta falls under the genre of Ethio-Jazz. Ethio-Jazz is a fusion of traditional Ethiopian music with jazz, soul, and Afro-funk. Little did I know that the musician, Mulatu Astatke, whose song I listened to, was the father of Ethio-Jazz himself.

Mulatu Astatke is widely considered the father of Ethio-Jazz as he had a significant influence on the genre. Astatke was born in Ethiopia in 1943 but moved to North Wales in his late teens with the intention of studying aeronautic engineering. It was there he became interested in music and the arts, which he later pursued as a profession. Astatke went on to study classical music at Trinity College in London while also working with a number of leading British jazz musicians. At the same time, he was intrigued by other African students who were presenting their cultural music to European audiences. While at the Berklee College of Music (Boston), Astatke created an innovative fusion of Jazz and traditional Ethiopian music. Over the next decade, this would evolve into what we know today as Ethio-Jazz.

The album in which Tezeta appears, Éthiopiques, Vol. 4, is really great and worth a listen. I have attached a YouTube link to it below.

Sources:

Last.fm: https://www.last.fm/music/Mulatu+Astatke/+wiki
The Culture Trip: https://theculturetrip.com/africa/ethiopia/articles/ethio-jazz-the-amazing-story-of-ethiopian-jazz-from-london-to-addis/