Pop superstar Beyoncé released "Texas Hold 'Em" a few weeks ago and it features an instrument that she had never emphasized before. This hit song, on her new (and hugely popular) Cowboy Carter album, ...

The steady, stinging pluck of Bassekou Kouyaté’s ngoni, the traditional, lute-like African stringed instrument, suggests dust hitting your face on a Sahel wind at dusk, when the day at last starts to ...

Discovering Francis Bebey was a really, really huge deal for me, because it supported my whole fascination with traditional string instruments. He’s a musicologist who wrote a book on African string ...