The history of “Xigaza” Music Part 1

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In 2025, and in previous years, “Xigaza” is a term used to describe electronic Xitsonga music.

What is Xigaza?

In Xitsonga, Xigaza means the way of the Gaza people.

Join us as we take a musical journey through history to understand the roots of the most popular Xitsonga genre currently in South Africa known as:

• Xigaza,
• Tiremix,
• Marimba,
• Ta le Gigini,
• Ta Makwhaya,
• Tsonga Electro,
• Shangaan Electro,
• Xigaza xa Ma2k, and many more…

Who are the Gaza people?

Defining the Gaza people is simple, but to people who identify as Magaza (people of Gaza) it’s a complex historic exercise because the meaning shifts depending on time and space.

So, let’s simplify it for you.

The root of the word

Originally, the word “Gaza” comes from the Nguni language of the Nxumayo people of the Tshaneni Mountains in present-day eSwatini. But there, the word was pronounced as Gasa, which means to have excessive pride in oneself. The word then morphed when the Nxumayo people reached present-day Mozambique in the 1800s, where the Portuguese recorded it as Gaza, and it stuck with them.

The man named Gasa

Before “Gaza” evolved into an identity, it was the name of a Ndwandwe Chief known as Gasa kaMakweya — grandfather of Manukuza kaZikode, known in history as uSoshangane, founder of the Gaza Kingdom.

The Kingdom of Gaza

By the time the Mfecane wars erupted, the people of Gasa were now in present-day South Africa, living in KwaNongoma as members of their cousin’s court, King Zwide kaLanga, where Soshangane was the head of the army. However, the people of Gasa were not pleased with being subjects of their cousins or of Shaka Zulu at that, and so they abandoned their brethren at the peak of the Ndwandwe vs. Zulu battle and fled back home to eSwatini. However, home had changed, the land was now under the rule of their in-laws oDlamini, and Zulu armies were approaching them to wipe them all out. So, they fled again, this time to present-day Mozambique where they entered the orbit of the people of the coast, Vatsonga…

Who are Tsonga people?

Vatsonga are indigenous people of the coastal zone of Southern Africa, who live in areas extending from St. Lucia Bay on the northern KwaZulu-Natal coast, up to the Save river in Inhambane Province of Mozambique — who originate from the people of dawn known today as the Batwa (Vatshwa) aboriginals.

Ntonga (Port) > Thonga (Channel) > Tonga (Bay) > Tsonga (East)

Today, their descendants are known as Batonga, Balenge, Baronga, Bacopi, and Vahlengwe. A people that started as a hunting and fishing community of sun worshipers, and evolved into independent Kingdoms of elite artisans, diviners, merchants, and miners from the knowledge they got from Asian, Arabic, Kushite, Nubian, Indian, Mbo, and Semantic races that they interacted with for thousands of years before the arrival of the Nguni people in Southern Africa.

Vatsonga vs. Machangani

Why?

Read more:

The history of “Xigaza” Music Part 2.