How music changes the way we remember a place

You're in a taxi in Paris, Montreal or Johannesburg. The driver's radio plays an old song — a rumba from Kinshasa, a highlife from Accra, a funk track from 1970s Cotonou. Suddenly, you're not in the taxi anymore. You're back in your grandmother's courtyard, or at a wedding in your neighbourhood, or dancing at a street party when you were 15.

The smell of grilled fish. The sound of moto horns. The faces of friends. All of it, in three seconds.

Music has a strange power: it can carry us to places — and times — we thought we'd forgotten.

How does music shape the way we remember places, and why is African music so powerful at holding the memory of cities, villages and communities?

The science: why music triggers memories

Psychologists and neuroscientists have studied this effect for years.

• Music-evoked autobiographical memories: Research by neuroscientist Petr Janata (University of California, Davis) found that familiar music activates a brain region (the medial prefrontal cortex) linked to memory and self-identity. Music can trigger vivid personal memories, often with strong emotions.
• The "reminiscence bump": People tend to remember music from their teenage years and early twenties most strongly. Those songs often become the soundtrack of our lives.
• Emotion: Music triggers emotions, and emotional events are remembered better.
• Music and dementia: Studies and care programmes show that people with dementia can often remember songs and even lyrics long after other memories fade.

People tend to have especially strong memories and preferences for music heard between roughly ages 10 and 30 — a pattern known as the "reminiscence bump." (Krumhansl & Zupnick, Psychological Science, 2013) The songs of your teenage years may be the ones that bring your hometown back most vividly.

Joke break: Every family has an uncle who says "Today's music is just noise." Then a song from 1978 plays, and the same uncle dances like he's 19 again, singing every word, knees apparently unaware of their age.

Music as the memory of cities

Some cities are remembered through their music:

• Kinshasa and Brazzaville: Congolese rumba — recognised by UNESCO as intangible cultural heritage in 2021 — carries memories of dance halls, independence and urban life.
• Lagos: Afrobeat, created by Fela Kuti in the late 1960s–1970s, captured the energy, politics and chaos of the city.
• Accra and Kumasi: highlife, connected to celebrations and nightlife.
• Johannesburg: kwaito and later amapiano, sounds of townships and youth culture.
• Dakar: mbalax, with Youssou N'Dour.
• Abidjan: coupé-décalé and zouglou.

For people who grew up there — or who left — these sounds are the city.

Cotonou's golden sound: Orchestre Poly-Rythmo

In Benin, one band captures the memory of 1970s Cotonou like no other: the Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou, founded in 1968.

Poly-Rythmo mixed Vodun rhythms with funk, soul, Afrobeat, highlife and Latin music. They recorded hundreds of songs, played in clubs and backed famous singers. For many Beninese, their music is the soundtrack of youth, independence-era optimism and nights out in Cotonou.

Decades later, European labels reissued their records, and the band toured internationally, introducing new audiences to the sound of 1970s Benin. Older fans rediscovered their youth; younger listeners discovered their parents' city.

"Music is the shorthand of emotion." — attributed to Leo Tolstoy

Angélique Kidjo: carrying Benin to the world

Beninese singer Angélique Kidjo, born in Ouidah and raised in Cotonou, has carried the sounds and languages of Benin — Fon, Yoruba, Goun — to stages around the world. She has won multiple Grammy Awards and collaborated with artists across genres and continents.

For Beninese in the diaspora, hearing her songs can be a way of feeling close to home. For listeners elsewhere, her music may be their first "picture" of Benin. That's music shaping how a place is remembered — and imagined.

Music, migration and diaspora

For people who leave home — students, workers, refugees — music becomes a portable homeland. A playlist can bring back the sound of a market, a church, a street party or a grandmother's kitchen.

Diaspora communities often keep musical traditions alive abroad — sometimes more carefully than at home. And they mix them with new influences, creating new sounds. Afrobeats' global rise owes a lot to diaspora communities in London, Paris and New York. See How creative teams work across African borders.

Music and ceremonies: memory built in

In many African cultures, music is part of life's key moments:

• Births and naming ceremonies.
• Weddings.
• Funerals.
• Religious ceremonies — including Vodun rituals in Benin, where drums and songs connect the living and the ancestors.
• Festivals and national celebrations.

Because music is linked to these important events, songs become memory markers. Hearing a funeral song may bring back the memory of a loved one; a wedding song may remind you of a family celebration.

When places change, music remembers

Cities change fast. Neighbourhoods are rebuilt. Markets move. Clubs close. Old buildings disappear. Music can preserve memories of places that no longer exist.

Listening to 1970s recordings from Cotonou, Lagos or Kinshasa, you can almost hear the cities as they were. Music becomes a kind of archive.

That's why efforts to preserve old recordings matter. Many African recordings exist only on fragile tapes and vinyl in private collections. Projects to digitise and archive them help keep musical memory alive.

Music in public spaces

Music also shapes how we experience places today:

• The call to prayer, church bells or Vodun drums marking time in a neighbourhood.
• Loudspeakers in markets.
• Music blaring from shops and taxis.
• Street performers and marching bands.

Urban planners and sociologists call this the "soundscape" of a city. It's part of a place's identity — and part of what people miss when they leave.

How to use music to remember and share places

For individuals:

• Create a playlist for your hometown or a special period of your life.
• Ask elders what music they listened to when they were young — and listen together.
• Record sounds of your neighbourhood: market, church, street life.

For schools:

• Music history projects: What did your city sound like in 1960, 1980, 2000?
• Interview parents and grandparents about their favourite songs.
• Connect music to history lessons (independence songs, protest songs).

For cultural spaces:

• Music-themed exhibitions linking songs to places and events.
• Listening sessions with elders and young people together.
• Archives of local recordings. See Why cultural spaces need young visitors.

An illustrative family playlist

Imagine a family in Porto-Novo (illustrative) that makes a "family playlist" over a holiday. Grandfather adds Poly-Rythmo and Congolese rumba. Mother adds 1990s zouglou and Angélique Kidjo. The teenagers add Afrobeats and amapiano. The youngest adds a children's song from school.

As they listen, stories come out: Grandfather's first dance, Mother's university days, the teenager's first concert. The playlist becomes a map of the family's life — and of their city across generations.

Music, tourism and city identity

Cities increasingly use music to attract visitors and build identity. Think of festivals, music neighbourhoods and live music venues that become symbols of a place. In Benin, events like the Vodun Days in Ouidah combine music, spirituality and performance, drawing visitors from across the country and abroad.

When music becomes part of a city's identity, it can support jobs for musicians, sound engineers, event organisers, restaurants and hotels. It also helps young people feel proud of where they live. See Why cultural spaces need young visitors.

Protecting musical memory

Many recordings of African music from the 1950s to 1980s were made on vinyl and tape. Some are lost; others survive in private collections, often in poor condition. Record collectors and labels have reissued many classics, but much remains undigitised.

Ways to protect musical memory:

• Digitise old family recordings (with care and permission).
• Support archives and libraries collecting local music.
• Interview older musicians about their careers.
• Credit and pay artists and their families when old music is reused.

Every saved recording is a saved piece of a place's history.

The soundtrack of home

Music doesn't just decorate our memories. It organises them. It connects places, people and times in ways that words alone can't. For Africa — a continent of extraordinary musical richness — music is one of the most powerful ways to remember where we come from.

So next time a song takes you back to a street you haven't seen in years, let it. You're not just listening. You're remembering.

Keep reading: The artists telling stories of today's Benin, The value of keeping African stories in local languages, and our Art & Culture section.

Questions

Why does music bring back memories?

Familiar music activates brain regions linked to memory and emotion, triggering vivid personal memories — especially of songs heard in our teens and early twenties.

What is the Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou?

A famous Beninese band founded in 1968 that mixed Vodun rhythms with funk, soul and Afrobeat, and became the soundtrack of 1970s Cotonou.

Is Congolese rumba recognised by UNESCO?

Yes. Congolese rumba was inscribed on UNESCO's list of intangible cultural heritage in 2021.