The Gangbé Brass Band is a 10-member Benin

Benin

Benin , officially the Republic of Benin, is a country in West Africa. It borders Togo to the west, Nigeria to the east and Burkina Faso and Niger to the north. Its small southern coastline on the Bight of Benin is where a majority of the population is located...

ese musical ensemble founded in 1994. The word "gangbe" means "sound of metal" in the Fon language

Fon language

Fon is part of the Gbe language cluster and belongs to the Volta–Niger branch of the Niger–Congo languages. Fon is spoken mainly in Benin by approximately 1.7 million speakers, by the Fon people...

. They blend West African juju

Jùjú music

Jùjú is a style of Nigerian popular music, derived from traditional Yoruba percussion. The name comes from a Yoruba word "juju" or "jiju" meaning "throwing" or "something being thrown." Juju music did not derive its name from juju, which "is a form of magic and the use of magic objects or...

 and traditional Vodou music with Western jazz and big-band sounds. Their unusual instrumentation---trumpet, trombone, and tuba, along with West African percussion and vocals---is, to some extent, part of West Africa's colonial legacy; French colonial officers imported brass instruments and trained local musicians to play European-style military and dance hall music.
Gangbe has released four albums: Gangbe (1998), Togbe (2001), Whendo (2004) and Assiko (2008), and tours extensively in Europe and North America.