Learn Hardcore Swahili: Watoto waliimba wimbo mmoja wakati mwalimu akipiga kinanda taratibu. - The children sang one song while the teacher gently played the keyboard.

The verb is considered a single unit, even though it contains several meaningful pieces (subject, tense, root, etc.). Writing them separately would be seen as a spelling/grammar mistake.

Why isn’t there a word for “the” in Watoto waliimba wimbo mmoja?

Swahili normally does not use articles like English “a, an, the”. Instead, definiteness is understood from context.

Watoto can mean children or the children, depending on what the speaker and listener know.
wimbo mmoja can be a song or one (specific) song, again from context.

So the English translation “The children sang one song” adds “the” and “one/a” to match natural English, but Swahili doesn’t need separate words for those ideas.

What exactly is wimbo mmoja, and why is it mmoja and not just moja?

wimbo = song (singular)
mmoja (spelled as one m: mmoja) = one, agreeing with the noun class of wimbo

Swahili adjectives, including numbers, usually agree with the noun class of the noun they describe. Here:

wimbo belongs to a noun class that uses m- for “one”.
The underlying form is m- + moja → mmoja (the doubled mm is written as mmoja).

So:

wimbo mmoja = one song
If you just said moja without the m-, it would sound wrong for this noun class in standard Swahili.

How would I say “The children sang songs” (plural)? How do wimbo and nyimbo work?

The noun wimbo has an irregular plural:

wimbo = song (singular)
nyimbo = songs (plural)

To say “The children sang songs”, you might say:

Watoto waliimba nyimbo.
→ The children sang songs.

You no longer need mmoja (“one”), because now it’s plural and indefinite: just songs in general.

What is the role of wakati in the sentence?

Wakati literally means “time”, but in structures like this it works as “when/while”:

wakati mwalimu akipiga kinanda taratibu
= while/when the teacher was playing the piano gently/slowly

So it introduces a time clause that gives the background situation against which the main action (watoto waliimba wimbo mmoja) happened.

Why is it mwalimu akipiga and not mwalimu alipiga?

Both are grammatically possible, but they have different aspect/feel:

alipiga: a- (he/she) + -li- (past) + piga → “he/she played” (simple past, completed action)
akipiga: a- (he/she) + -ki- (simultaneous/ongoing) + piga → roughly “as he/she was playing”, “while he/she was playing”

In this sentence, akipiga is used because the teacher’s action is ongoing background while the children are singing. In English we might show that with the past continuous:

The children sang one song while the teacher was playing the piano.

If you said:

…wakati mwalimu alipiga kinanda…

it would sound more like two completed past actions that happened in the same time frame, rather than one ongoing in the background.

What exactly does the -ki- in akipiga mean?

The -ki- in akipiga is a conjoint / simultaneous marker. Common uses:

“While/when doing X” (simultaneous action)
- akipiga kinanda → while he/she was playing the piano
“If/when (condition)…”
- ukisoma, utafaulu → If/when you study, you will pass.

In this sentence, -ki- links the teacher’s action to the children’s action in time, showing that the playing was ongoing as the singing happened.

Could I start the sentence with the wakati clause, like in English?

Yes. Swahili allows that word order too. For example:

Wakati mwalimu akipiga kinanda taratibu, watoto waliimba wimbo mmoja.

This is perfectly natural and means the same as:

Watoto waliimba wimbo mmoja wakati mwalimu akipiga kinanda taratibu.

The choice of order is usually about emphasis or style, not grammar correctness.

What does kinanda mean exactly? Is it specifically “piano”?

Kinanda is a general word for a keyboard instrument (something with keys), and in practice it often translates as:

piano
keyboard
sometimes organ

In many contexts, people will just say kinanda and the most natural English translation will be “piano”, unless the situation clearly involves another kind of keyboard.

What does taratibu mean here, and what kind of word is it?

In this sentence, taratibu is used as an adverb meaning:

slowly
gently
carefully

So:

akipiga kinanda taratibu
≈ was playing the piano gently/slowly.

Some extra notes:

taratibu can also be a noun meaning procedures / steps, but here the meaning is clearly adverbial.
Its position is flexible; you might also hear akipiga taratibu kinanda, though many speakers prefer it at the end, as in the original sentence.

Why isn’t there an object marker on akipiga for kinanda (like akikipiga)?

Swahili can mark direct objects in two ways:

Just with the noun:
- Anapiga kinanda. → He is playing the piano.
With an object marker on the verb (especially when the object is already known/definite/emphasized):
- Anakipiga kinanda. → roughly He is playing it (the piano).

In the sentence:

mwalimu akipiga kinanda taratibu

kinanda appears once, after the verb, and there’s no special need to emphasize “it”, so the object marker -ki- is not required. Using akikipiga kinanda would sound a bit redundant here unless you were emphasizing or had already mentioned kinanda earlier in the conversation.

How would the verb change if it were just one child instead of children?

You’d change the subject and the subject prefix on the verb:

Watoto waliimba → The children sang
Mtoto aliimba → The child sang

So a singular version of the sentence could be:

Mtoto aliimba wimbo mmoja wakati mwalimu akipiga kinanda taratibu.
→ The child sang one song while the teacher was playing the piano gently.

Changes:

Watoto (children) → Mtoto (child)
waliimba (“they sang”) → aliimba (“he/she sang”), where:
- a- = he/she
- -li- = past
- -imba = sing

Why don’t we need separate words like “they” or “he/she” in the sentence?

In Swahili, the subject information is built into the verb through the subject prefix:

waliimba → wa- (they) + -li- (past) + imba (sing)
→ “they sang”
akipiga → a- (he/she) + -ki- (simultaneous) + piga (play)
→ “while he/she was playing”

Because the verb already shows who is doing the action, separate subject pronouns (wao, yeye) are usually not needed unless you want to emphasize them (like saying “they did it, not someone else”).