Chimurenga music (from Shona chimurenga, 'struggle') is the electrified-band tradition Thomas Mapfumo established in 1970s Zimbabwe (then Rhodesia) by transposing rhythms from the Shona ritual mbira dzavadzimu (twenty-two-to-twenty-four-tine metal-key ancestor keyboard) onto electric guitar in a full band setting. The guitar carries mbira's cyclic two-voice motif, the bass mirrors the instrument's low-register bass keys, and the drums follow the eighth-note pulse of the hosho ritual shakers. Tempo sits at mid 4/4; melodies use Shona's mixed five-and-seven-note scales; lyrics are in Shona and treat colonial-regime critique, independence-struggle celebration, and later Mugabe-regime criticism. This entry overlaps the existing 'chimurenga' slug's Mapfumo-centred history but focuses more on the mbira-instrumental lineage and on non-Mapfumo carriers of the tradition.

During Zimbabwe's 1964–1979 independence war, Thomas Mapfumo — working under the Rhodesian white-minority regime — developed the strategy of translating Shona ritual mbira dzavadzimu riffs into an electric-band idiom. His Hallelujah Chicken Run Band started in 1974; the 1977 hit 'Hokoyo!' ('Watch out!') was thick with anti-colonial allusion and led to repeated detentions by the Rhodesian regime. After 1980 independence Mapfumo became a state-favoured star, but his 1988 'Corruption' broke with the Mugabe regime and he lived a critical stance thereafter, eventually going into exile in Oregon in the 2000s. Chiwoniso Maraire was born in 1976 to Dumisani Maraire, a mbira scholar-teacher active in Washington state; she returned to Zimbabwe in the 1990s and became the female electrified-mbira-rock carrier of her generation.

Focus first on the guitar. Chimurenga guitar does not strum chords like Western rock — it plays two-voice patterns mirroring mbira's right-hand and left-hand key motions, a vocabulary distinct from West African highlife guitar. Then hosho shakers provide the eighth-note pulse in the drum kit's place, and the bass plays a cyclic line derived directly from the mbira's bass keys. Chiwoniso Maraire's 'Ancient Voices' (1998) is a rare album that pairs electric-band with live mbira, letting the structural correspondence be clearly heard. Hope Masike's 'Hope' (2011) shows the tradition entering dialogue with modern jazz piano.

Start with Chiwoniso Maraire's 'Ancient Voices' (1998, Tuku Music), where she interleaves mbira and electric band on equal footing. Then her 'Rebel Woman' (2008) for the mature electric line. Hope Masike's 'Hope' (2011) opens the tradition toward jazz. Read alongside the existing 'chimurenga' entry's Thomas Mapfumo canon (especially 'Hokoyo!' 1977 and 'Corruption' 1988) to hear the male-lineage side that this entry deliberately downplays.

'Chimurenga' in Shona means 'struggle'; historically, the term marks the 1896–97 Ndebele-Shona war ('First Chimurenga'), the 1964–79 independence war ('Second Chimurenga'), and the 2000s Mugabe-era land reform ('Third Chimurenga'). Thomas Mapfumo went into exile in Oregon in 2004 and could not return until after Mugabe's 2017 removal from power. Chiwoniso Maraire died in 2013 at just thirty-nine, from pneumonia, cutting short one of the most vital voices of her generation. Her father Dumisani Maraire opened a mbira course at the University of Washington in 1968, effectively founding North American academic study of the instrument.