Mzansi’s wedding and jazz music taste expands and inspires playlists on Spotify

In September 2019, a year and a few months after Spotify’s launch in South Africa, there were 3 billion user-generated playlists on Spotify. This number is nearly triple in 2024, at 8 billion. South Africans have also taken a liking to playlist creation on the platform, especially looking at wedding and jazz music playlist data which have just been released – covering the period between 2018 to date.

Weddings the Mzansi way 

The popular wedding seasons, September to December, and February to April see more playlists created by mostly older millennials between the ages of 35 to 44. As one can expect, South Africa’s diversity is evident in the naming of the playlists. Words in playlist titles created in the country since 2018 range from ‘umabo’ to ‘lenyalo’. The former is an isiZulu term referring to the closing ceremony of a traditional Zulu wedding. At the same time, the latter is used interchangeably in Sepedi for the wedding itself and the actual marriage. In addition to ‘umabo’ being used constantly, other words revealed by data include ‘ukwenda’ and ‘mucato’.

Sepedi wedding music, accompanied by a well-known choreography often referred to as ‘step sa lenyalo’/ ‘stepe’/ ‘Setepe’, might be the inspiration behind the more than 280 and 930 playlists with the ‘tsa manyalo’ and ‘lenyalo’ wording in their titles, respectively. When looking at the tracks on Spotify that heavily lean on the Mzansi way, there are over 600 tracks with the word ‘Makoti’ in the title.

Top South African Tracks added to wedding playlists since 2018

1. Ndihamba Nawe – Mafikizolo

2. Kgomo (Wedding Song) – Jonas Gwangwa

3. Vuli Ndlela – Brenda Fassie

4. Wedding Day – Brenda Fassie

5. Emlanjeni – Mafikizolo

Top South African Artists added to wedding playlists since 2018

1. Mafikizolo

2. Brenda Fassie

3. Kurt Darren

4. Pleasure Tsa Manyalo

5. Malaika

Smooth operator

A huge percentage of males consume jazz compared with less than 35% of females. Unexpectedly, the gap between young Gen Zs and older millennials is minimal, at 20% and 23%, respectively. Jazz also resonates far more in big cities than anywhere else with Johannesburg, Cape Town, and Pretoria in the top five.  Naturally, in naming the playlist, the genre will lead. But just like the weddings, ‘African Jazz’, ‘Marabi’, ‘Kwela’ and ‘Jive’ feature consistently in playlist naming.

The playlist creation per data facilitates the resurgence of historical and heritage jazz music on Spotify. ‘Marabi’, ‘Kwela’, and ‘Jive’ date back to the apartheid era, and are mentioned simultaneously with a significant and historical area like Sophiatown.

Top South African Artists added to Jazz playlists since 2018

1. Hugh Masekela

2. Sipho Gumede

3. Jonas Gwangwa

4. Jonathan Butler

5. Stimela

Top South African Tracks added to Jazz playlists since 2018

1. When Days Are Dark, Friends Are Few – Sipho Gumede

2. Kgomo (Wedding Song) – Jonas Gwangwa

3. Thanayi – Hugh Masekela

4. Matswale – Caiphus Semenya

5. Morwa -Jonas Gwangwa

Recently launched Spotify-curated Mzansi Jazz Archive and  It’s A Wedding Day playlists are live on Spotify. The Mzansi Jazz Archive – a tapestry of South African Jazz through the decades, and  It’s A Wedding Day – Mzansi wedding classics for your big day, playlists include classics and well-known songs.