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Zouk
The Antilles on the dance floor
Zouk is the dance music of the French Antilles — Guadeloupe and Martinique — created by the band Kassav' in the early 1980s and sung largely in Antillean Creole. It carried Caribbean Creole music to audiences across Africa, Europe and Latin America.
Origin & history
Kassav' formed in 1979 and built zouk out of Guadeloupean and Martinican carnival traditions, gwo ka and biguine, with the studio technology of the time.
Sung in Antillean Creole rather than French, zouk became one of the most widely travelled Creole-language musics in the world, with a particularly deep following in West and Central Africa.
Notable artists
Kassav'
The Guadeloupean-Martinican band credited with creating zouk at the end of the 1970s.
Jocelyne Béroard
Martinican singer of Kassav', one of the voices that defined the genre.
Questions & Answers
What is zouk?+
Zouk is the dance music of Guadeloupe and Martinique, created by the band Kassav' in the early 1980s and sung mostly in Antillean Creole.
What language is zouk sung in?+
Mostly Antillean Creole, which is one reason the music travelled so widely through other Creole-speaking regions.
Is zouk the same as konpa?+
No. Konpa is Haitian and older; zouk comes from the French Antilles and was shaped in part by Haitian konpa among other Caribbean styles. They are neighbours, not the same genre.
