Music of Solomon Islands

Traditional Melanesian music in Solomon Islands includes both group and solo vocals, slit-drum and panpipe ensembles.

[1] After American soldiers brought their sandals to the Solomon Islands, these replaced coconut husks by the early 1960s, just as the music began spreading to Papua New Guinea.

[4] Traditional Melanesian choir singing features heavily in the soundtrack of the film The Thin Red Line, which is set against the backdrop of the Battle for Guadalcanal.

In 1969/1970, ethnomusicologist Hugo Zemp recorded a number of local songs which were released on an LP in 1973, as a part of the UNESCO Musical Sources collection.

One of the songs, a lullaby named "Rorogwela", sung by Afunakwa, a Northern Malaita woman, was used as a vocal sample in a 1992 single "Sweet Lullaby" by the French electronica duo Deep Forest, becoming a worldwide hit but also causing some controversy over perceived "pillaging" of the world music heritage by Western musicians.