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Agawu, Kofi. The African Imagination in Music. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2016. [Google Books]
Carver, Mendy. Understanding African Music. Grahamstown: Rhodes University, International Library of African Music, 2012. [Amazon]
Draper, Jonathan A., and Kenneth Mtata. “Orality and African Religions”, in The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to African Religions, ed. E.K. Bongmba, p. 97‒111. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012. [Google Books]
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- Hornbostel is often regarded as the founder of Comparative Musicology. Note his vote on p. 62 that African hymns should be played and sung in an African an not a European way.
Merriam, Alan P. The Anthropology of Music. Chicago: Northwestern University Press, 1964. [Google Books]
Nettl, Bruno. The Study of Ethnomusicology: Thirty-Three Discussions. 3rd edition. Urbana, etc.: University of Illinois Press, 2015. [Google Books]
Nketia, J.H. Kwabena. The Music of Africa. New York, NY; London: W.W. Norton & Company, 1974.
Schrag, Brian. Artistic Dynamos: An Ethnography on Music in Central African Kingdoms. New York; Abingdon: Routledge, 2021. [Preview; companion website]
Small, Christopher. Musicking: The Meanings of Performing and Listening. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1998. [Google Books]
Shelemay, Kay Kaufman. Soundscapes: Exploring Music in a Changing World. 3rd edition. New York; London: W. W. Norten & Company, 2015. [W.W. Norten]
Sturman, Janet, ed. The SAGE International Encyclopedia of Music and Culture. 5 vols. Thousand Oaks, CA, etc.: Sage Publications, 2019. [Online version (subscription wall); 2 articles on Ethiopia by David Evans]
Wade, Bonnie C. Thinking Musically: Experiencing Music, Expressing Culture (Global Music Series), 3rd edition. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013.