India Honours Black Music

This year, in honour of Black Music Month, we’re exploring the undeniable impact of Black music and musicians around the world. Though there are few notable Black artists, the influence of Black music in India is unmistakable. Outside of Bollywood and other regional soundtrack music (which make up the major chunk of music coming out of India), there is music which is broadly classified as Indian independent. Under this umbrella, the most exciting and rapidly growing form of music is hip-hop. While it is very evidently influenced by Black music, these local artists have made this form of music entirely their own, as young artists are no longer afraid to rap in the language that comes naturally to them, resulting in rap in Hindi, Punjabi, Tamil, Malayalam, Kashmiri, Odia, Kannada and a myriad of other languages. Dive into our Black Music Month playlist, and if you hear something you like, save it to your library.