African stars make Rolling Stone’s 200 Greatest Singers of All Time

3 Jan 2023 - 12:08

Published under the Creative Commons Licence

African music greats including Afrobeat founder Fela Kuti, Senegalese tenor Youssou N’Dour, South African vocal powerhouse Miriam Makeba and Afro-fusion star Burna Boy have been named in Rolling Stone’s list of the 200 Best Singers of All Time.

Fela Kuti, Burna Boy, Miriam Makeba Youssou N’Dour have all been named in Rolling Stone’s 200 Greatest Singers of All Time list.

Rolling Stone said occupants of the list, which features other global pop icons such as Beyoncé, Prince, Aretha Franklin, Cher, Whitney Houston, Sam Cooke, Billie Holiday, Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder, were selected based on “originality, influence, the depth of an artist’s catalogue, and the breadth of their musical legacy.” It added this update was compiled by staff and key contributors, encompassing “100 years of pop music as an ongoing global conversation.”

The US publication’s latest ranking follows a 2008 one comprising the 100 greatest singers of all time, which it said was achieved via “an elaborate voting process that included input from well-known musicians.”

Fela was ranked 188, while N’Dour, Makeba and Burna Boy took 69th, 53rd and 197th positions, respectively.

Rolling Stone describes Fela as one who, “through his music, shared an anti-colonialist, Pan-African vision and challenged Nigeria’s corrupt military government, which routinely subjected him and those around him to immense harm.” N’Dour has been termed as “as instantly commanding as the young Michael Jackson,” while Makeba was “a fountain of vocal personality.” Burna Boy’s voice is said to be “sweet like caramel ... it can also soar on slickly produced tracks…”

Other African musicians who make an appearance on the list include South African mbaqanga singer Mahlathini (153), Egyptian star Umm Kulthum (61) and British-Nigerian soul singer Sade Adu (51).

The publication writes that Mahlathini was “a peerless figure in the history of South African music, gifted with a cloud-rattling basso profundo groan, and a knowing, playful, at times diabolically incisive sense of what to do with it.”

Kulthum, on the other hand, possesses a “potent contralto, which could blur gender in its lower register, conveyed breathtaking emotional range in complex songs that, across theme and wildly-ornamented variations, could easily last an hour, as she worked crowds like a fiery preacher.”

The publication says Sade is behind a “languid cool” that “has a way of making everyone else sound histrionic.”

View the complete list here.

Rolling Stone