Abebe Bikila Abebe Bikila Abebe Bikila (; August 7, 1932 – October 25, 1973) was an Ethiopian marathon runner. A double Olympic marathon champion, he won the first at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome while running barefoot, setting a world record. He is Africa's first world record breaking athlete in any sport and the first sub-Saharan African Olympic gold medallist. At the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Abebe became the first athlete to successfully defend an Olympic marathon title, breaking his own world record in the process. He was a member of the Ethiopian Imperial Guard, an elite infantry division that
Traditional sub-Saharan African harmony parallel in theory. the creation of harmonic sound is accomplished within a relatively loose combination of individual voices, fluctuating between triads, bichords and more or less dense accumulations of notes. the exact shape of the chords, the duplication and omissions of individual notes in the total pattern may change with every repetition." See: Traditional sub-Saharan African harmony This article discusses the music theory of Traditional sub-Saharan African harmony. Sub-Saharan harmony is based on the principles of homophonic parallelism (chords based around a leading melody that follow its rhythm and contour), homophonic polyphony (independent parts moving together), counter melody (secondary melody)