After listening to hours of African Christmas music, I can confidently say that these albums and songs will put your heart in the mood of worship and make your feet and body vibrate. While globally, African music is best known for the highlife and afrobeat genres, artists across the continent incorporate jazz, a cappella, R&B, rap, dance and hip-hop into their music.
As a British Ghanaian now living in the United States and having sung in choirs and led worship, I count them among my favorite African Christmas gospel songs, largely from the English-speaking world, representing these very varied styles of music and showcasing highlighting collaborations with other countries around the world. class artists.
If we missed any of your favorites, send us an email at ctafrica@christianitytoday.com!
FLorocka is a Nigerian gospel artist and producer who has been in the music and production industry for over 27 years and is a multi-award winning singer and producer. He has collaborated with other renowned Nigerian artists, including Helen Yawson and Sammie Okposo.
Florocka’s 2021 album, Another Christmas according to Florockais a dance album (think J Moss-type songs, especially “Keresimesi”) featuring pop and hip-hop tracks alongside songs like “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen”, which sort of mixes music from the Middle -Orient with rock and a rap bridge.
J.ehovah Shalom Acapella is a six-member Ugandan group who released the five-track EP Joy to the world in 2020. The title song, an adaptation of the Isaac Watts classic, begins in English before switching to Luganda, and the song “Enkya Ennungi Esembedde” (“I Speak to the World of His Love”) is entirely in the Bantu language.
Last year, the Seventh-day Adventist ensemble released another Christmas EP, The manger and the cross, which includes versions of standard Christmas hymns like “Angels We Have Heard on High” and “Hark the Herald Angels Singing.” The final song on the EP is the title track, which shifts the listener’s focus from the Nativity to the crucifixion: “He was born to save a wretch like me / An incredible love, how could it be / That you, my Lord, die. In my opinion.”
J.Jonathan Butler, much admired and Grammy-nominated singer, songwriter, raised in apartheid South Africa, was the first black South African whose music appeared on white radio and television national in this segregated country. Nelson Mandela once credited Butler’s music inspired him during his imprisonment.
In Christmas togetherreleased in 2019, Butler features several classic holiday collaborations with world-class American artists like R&B singer Sheléa and saxophonists Dave Koz, Kirk Whalum and Gerald Albright, the latter performing a groovy rendition of “Deck the Halls.”
Christmas together is Butler’s second Christmas album, following Merry Christmas to you (2013). Butler is currently on tour and will perform with Koz and others throughout the Christmas period in the United States this month.
J.oyous Celebration is a South African choir founded in 1994 as apartheid was ending and launched the careers of former lead singers turned solo artists Ntokozo Mbambo, Nqubeko Mbatha and Mahalia Buchanan.
A Joyous Christmas (Live), released in 2018, offers an African sound with an R&B touch. The album opens with the choir singing “Jesus, Lover of My Soul” to JS Bach’s “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring”, an unexpected but festive combination of contemporary and traditional. The album features favorites like “Your Grace,” “Give You All the Glory” and “Who Am I,” as well as songs in Zulu, one of South Africa’s major languages, like “Uyangihola” ( “He Leads Me”). , “Bhekani UJehova” (“Praise the Lord”) and “Hallelujah Nkateko (Lihle version)” (“Hallelujah Blessing”).
KODA is a Ghanaian artist famous for his highlife music, which mixes the sounds of jazz, rock, hip-hop and afrobeat. In the song “Christmas in Tadi” by KODA, he creates a medley of “Silent Night” and “O Holy Night” with traditional Ghanaian guitars, pianos and drums. (“Tadi” is an affectionate term for Takoradi, a town in Ghana where KODA is from.)
KODA released their debut album in 2017, which addressed the challenges of the Ghanaian church and pastors too focused on money on tracks like “Nsem Pii» (“A lot of problems”), making him famous among many Ghanaian Christians. While KODA is known for upbeat high-life dance tunes like “Nsem Pii,” “Christmas in Tadi” is a thoughtful mid-tempo ballad composed of familiar Christmas tunes.
NOTiiella is a UK-based Ghanaian singer, songwriter and vocal coach who appeared on season 10 of BET’s. Sunday clothes. After her success on the show, Niiella continued to release music and collaborate with African and Western Christian artists like Joe Mettle and The Spirituals.
Last month, Niiella released her single “Christmas Night,” a melodic and moving choral song where she reminds us:
A child is born
To save all man
And I gave, I gave eternal life
A child is born
To bring salvation to the earth
It was Christmas Eve.
NOTtokozo Mbambo, who began his career with the vocal group Joyous Celebration, has found success as a dynamic solo artist, songwriter and performer. His 2020 Christmas live album The first Christmas features a rendition of “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” in which she sings in English and Zulu, then sings in English and Twi on “Yinaye” (“Praise God”).
The South African singer’s record also includes covers of classic Christmas songs like “O Holy Night,” “O Come Let Us Adore Him” and “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel,” as well as CeCe Winans’ hit ” Jesus, You’re.” Beautiful.”
Efrom the Egyptian Christian music group Praise Team Egypt, Praise Team Youth is a non-denominational choir which includes singers and band members from Orthodox, Catholic and Evangelical backgrounds. The team has recorded 40 albums and sings in Arabic and English on their albums.
The group came into being after its founder, Boules Boushra, visited a number of European countries and realized that most songs in Egypt were focused more on petition and lament than praise and worship. After translating some songs into Arabic, he began writing his own music and organizing a group to perform this work with the aim of encouraging “Christians throughout the Arab world must praise God as He wishes. » In their song “In the Christmas Night”, they sing in Arabic:
On Christmas night,
The bright star of the sky,
Let the light of God shine,
Then the Lord will be exalted.
P.rinx Emmanuel is a Nigerian gospel singer-songwriter, producer and recording and performing artist who has previously collaborated with well-known Nigerian artists, such as Limoblaze and Moses Bliss.
On his 2022 Christmas single “Afrobeat Christmas,” he mixes “Hark the Herald” with “Little Drummer Boy” in a result that could be played immediately on any Top 40 station. You might end up dancing!
SInach is one of the most famous Nigerian Christian singers, better known for his worldwide success “Way Maker”. American artists like Leeland, Michael W. Smith, Bethel Music and Dante Bowe have released their versions of the widely used worship song. Sinach has been leading worship and recording music for over 25 years. “Way Maker” won Song of the Year at the GMA Dove Awards and the BMI Christian Awards, and in 2016, Sinach became the first winner of the LIMA Songwriter of the Decade Award.
Sinach’s 2013 R&B Christmas album, Sinach at Christmasfeatures classic Christmas songs alongside originals, including his hit song “I Know Who I Am.”
THe Spirituals is an Afro-British gospel choir whose 2020 version of “Wade in the Water” went viral and earned them a performance at St. Paul’s Cathedral. The group, which reinvents and adapts traditional black spirituals, produced a four-track EP for Christmas, Christmas project, which fuses modern gospel with favorite Christmas carols and hymns. The album features Niiella, who is one of the choir directors, as well as Christian R&B and neo-soul singer Kaye-Marie.
The band’s rendition of “O Holy Night (Beautiful Savior)” begins with an energetic instrumental interlude featuring the melody of “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel”, which builds into a choral swell, leading into a solo performance moving and little accompanied by the first verse. A spirited “Hark the Herald (Sing Out Loud)” enlivens the traditional Christmas anthem with handclaps, syncopations, choral harmonies, refrains and vocal interludes. This is a joyful, modern arrangement of a favorite that truly captures the spirit of a choir of angels singing in exultation.
WThe Uganda Atoto Children’s Choir began in 1994 through Watoto Church, a Kampala congregation established in the 1980s when the civil war broke out. According to its website, the church Was launched to bring healing to the nation and help rebuild the country.
The choir’s 2021 album, What child is this (Emirembe), features a blend of Afrobeat and R&B sensibilities alongside the choir’s signature claps and joyful call-and-response screams. The lullaby “We Three Kings” plays with the structure and melody of the traditional Christmas carol, interspersing solo verses with interjections from the choir. Listeners will be struck by the musicality and talent of the young singers, who have performed around the world in front of large audiences and heads of state.
Akosua Frempong, Ph.D., is a freelance journalist at the Evangelical Press Association, an adjunct professor at Regent University in Virginia, and founder of Listening Ear Communications. She loves music and has been singing in churches in Europe and Africa for several years, including leading worship in local churches.
