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Bella Bellow

1945–1973

Togolese roots-pop

About Bella Bellow

Bella Bellow is the voice Togo measures its popular music against. She sang in Ewé and French with a depth that got her called the blueswoman of Africa, and she performed at the 1969 Pan-African festival in Algiers alongside Miriam Makeba and Manu Dibango. A car accident near Lomé killed her in 1973, when she was twenty-eight. Her small recorded output has been reissued and covered continuously since.