It's such a broad question really. Are we talking about the music to entertain the elites; music havng to do with religious ceremonies; village music having to do with marriage, funerals, other rites of passage, not to mention work chants?

With regard to the work chants, you better believe that a team of workers wouldn't have been hauling up a large stone block for a pyramid without chanting, and probably the overseer complained that they were singing rude lyrics! There were probably similar chants for launching boats.

When I was working as a teacher in Ethiopia, 45 years ago with the Peace Corps, the work chants were still alive and well in that small rural town. I still have recording of ones used by teams of workers as they hauled up huge banana trees for transplanting; they sounded very much like a halyard shanty in a weird minor key complete with hitches and yips, and my students replied to my request for translation "But, Sir, they're not singing the right words; they're being very rude!" They used similar work songs for lifting the huge center post for supporting their lovely round houses.

Cheerily,
Charley Noble