🌴 What is Zouk?

Zouk is a music and dance genre that originated in the French Caribbean islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique in the early 1980s. The name comes from Antillean Creole, meaning “party” or “festival,” which captures its festive and vibrant spirit.

Zouk was born thanks to the group Kassav’, founded in 1979 by Jacob Desvarieux and Pierre-Édouard Décimus. They fused various Caribbean styles—such as Haitian Kompa, Cadence, Calypso, and Merengue—with modern carnival sounds and electronic percussion. The result was a powerful, danceable music style that used both traditional and electronic instruments and was sung mainly in French Creole.

Thanks to its popularity, Zouk spread from the Antilles to Europe and Africa, especially to Portuguese-speaking African countries like Angola, Cape Verde, and Guinea-Bissau. In Angola, Zouk was a major influence on the evolution of Semba, which eventually gave rise to what we now know as Kizomba.

Today, Zouk is more than just a music genre—it’s a symbol of Afro-Caribbean identity.