Amapiano, the word being used to describe what’s currently South Africa’s fastest-growing electronic-music movement. Emerging around the townships of Pretoria in 2016, Amapiano is a medley of deep house, jazz, kwaito and lounge music with distinct synths, airy pads, wide basslines and percussions from another local subgenre of house called Bacardi. The name was selected to reflect the melodious piano keyboards that underlie fast-pace Gqom beats. It is a combination of the Zulu plural article “ama” and the English noun “piano”.
