A rhythmically propulsive dance music,marabi was forged principally by unschooled keyboard players who were a notorious part of theculture and economy of illegal slumyard liquor dens. Harmonically, it rested upon a cyclical patternstretched over four measures, with one measure per chord: I–IV–I6-4–V. The cyclical nature of this styleclearly derived from indigenous sources, repetitive harmonic patterns being typical of traditionalAfrican musics