In the late 1960s, Luo musicians in Nairobi took the nyatiti lyre patterns their grandfathers played and transferred them to electric guitar. The result was benga: fast, cyclical, propulsive, unmistakably Kenyan. By 1975, it was the sound of matatus, bars, and transistor radios from Kisumu to Mombasa. George Ramogi, D.O. Misiani, and Collela Maze became household names. One generation turned a village music tradition into the first truly national popular music Kenya ever had.