focho, noun

Forms:
Also foco.
Origin:
Southern Sotho, Tsonga, Northern and Southern SothoShow more Etymology obscure: perhaps related to Southern Sotho fôjho intoxicating drink; or related to Tsonga ideophone fòxò of a crashing sound; or from Northern and Southern Sotho phošo mistake; see also quotation 1980.
Music
A neo-traditional style of Sotho music, played usually on a concertina (or accordion) and drum.
Note:
Focho evolved in the early 1900s, and was a forerunner of tsaba-tsaba.
1980 D.B. Coplan Urbanization of African Performing Arts. 72Sotho migrants produced neo-traditional music with the concertina, guitar, and voice..within the structure of the Western ‘three-chord’..system. Older informants can recall this music, called focho (‘disorder’) being played in Johannesburg as early as the decades preceding the First World War.
1990 G. Slovo Ties of Blood 109The..traditional sound of foco as a concertina and homemade drum joined together to create their own kind of disorder.
A neo-traditional style of Sotho music, played usually on a concertina (or accordion) and drum.
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