Much of this reading list was culled from the Web site of the Center for Black Music Research, a research unit of Columbia College in Chicago. We thank the center for their assistance, and we encourage you to visit their site, www.cbmr.org, for more information about the music of the African diaspora.

• Agawu, V. Kofi. African Rhythm: A Northern Ewe Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
• Austerlitz, Paul. Merengue: Dominican Music and Dominican Identity. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1997.
• Averill, Gage. "Caribbean Music: Haiti and Trinidad." In Music in Latin American Culture: Regional Traditions, ed. John Schecter. New York: Schirmer, 1999.
• Barlow, William. Looking Up at Down: The Emergence of Blues Culture. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1989.
• Barlow, William, and Cheryl Finley. From Swing to Soul: An Illustrated History of African American Popular Music from 1930 to 1960. Washington, D.C.: Elliott and Clark, 1994.
• Béhague, Gerard. Hector Villa-Lobos: The Search for Brazil’s Musical Soul. Austin: Institute of Latin American Studies, University of Texas at Austin, 1994.
• Berrian, Brenda F. Awakening Spaces: French Caribbean Popular Songs, Music, and Culture. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000.
• Boyer, Horace Clarence. How Sweet the Sound: The Golden Age of Gospel. Washington, D.C.: Elliott and Clark, 1995.
• Broughton, Viv. Black Gospel: An Illustrated History of the Gospel Sound. New York: Blandford Press, 1985.
• Daniel, Yvonne. Rumba: Dance and Social Change in Contemporary Cuba. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1995.
• DeVeaux, Scott. The Birth of Bebop: A Social and Musical History. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997.
• Epstein, Dena J. Sinful Tunes and Spirituals: Black Folk Music to the Civil War. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1977.
• Gerard, Charley, with Marty Sheller. Salsa! The Rhythm of Latin Music. Crown Point, Ind.: White Cliffs, 1989.
• Guilbault, Jocelyne. Zouk: World Music in the West Indies. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993.
• Harrison, Daphne Duval. Black Pearls: Blues Queens of the 1920s. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1990.
• Hill, Donald R. Calypso Calaloo. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1993.
• Kazadi wa Mukuna. "The Changing Role of the Guitar in the Urban Music of Zaire." World of Music 36, 2 (1994): 62–72.
• Keil, Charles. Urban Blues. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991.
• Manual, Peter, ed. Essays on Cuban Music: North American and Cuban Perspectives. Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 1991.
• McDaniel, Lorna. The Big Drum Ritual of Carriacou: Praisesongs in Rememory of Flight. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1998.
• Morgan, Thomas L., and William Barlow. From Cakewalks to Concert Halls: An Illustrated History of African American Popular Music from 1895 to 1930. Washington, D.C.: Elliott & Clark, 1993.
• Pacini Hernandez, Deborah. Bachata: A Social History of a Dominican Popular Music. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1995.
• Potash, Chris, ed. Reggae, Rasta, Revolution: Jamaican Music from Ska to Dub. New York: Schirmer, 1997.
• Ramsey, Guthrie P. Race Music. Berkeley: University of California Press and Center for Black Music Research, forthcoming.
• Schuller, Gunther. The History of Jazz, vols. 1 and 2. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968 and 1989.
• Titon, Jeff Todd. Early Downhome Blues, 2nd ed. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1994.
• Warner, Keith Q. Kaiso! The Trinidad Calypso. Washington, D.C.: Three Continents Press, 1985.
• Warner-Lewis, Maureen. Yoruba Songs of Trinidad. London: Karnak House, 1994.