The making of kings and men

Some 230 odd years ago a boy was born. His birth was seen as scandalous and not befitting what was expected of his father. That he was born out of wedlock didn't make the situation any easier, and his parents separated when he was about 6 years old. His mother consequently returned to her people, and for the next few years, she and her 2 children, the boy and his sister, found themselves subject to daily taunts and humiliations. They eventually found shelter with a small clan. It was with the small clan that the boy would meet someone who would shape not only his life but that of many others.

When the boy's father rejected his mother, he by extension also rejected his son. In fact, when he'd heard that the boy's mother was pregnant, the story is that the boy's father suggested that his mother was not pregnant, but was rather suffering from a certain ailment. And it was this thoughtless response that led to the boy being given the name Shaka, because his father, Senzangakhona kaJama had said his mother, Nandi of Elangeni, had ishaka. Shaka grew to be the visionary, transformer, and leader that would see him transform a clan of about 2000 odd people to the vast amaZulu we know of today.

In the present day there are countless stories like that of Shaka. These stories are not of triumph, bravery, conquest, determination and leadership. Instead, these are stories that are marked and shaped by  abandonment, and an endemic a state of fatherlessness or absent fathers. While poverty and developmental challenges also play a role in fatherlessness, and have in turn contributed to boys being raised by single moms who are parenting the best way they know how, the absence of fathers has led to some of the problems we face in society today. The resentment and loneliness children feel due to having an absent father are perhaps why we have more than 60% of children in South Africa growing up in a fatherless home.

Like Shaka, the children of today have fathers who are alive but are not present in their lives. The extent of the psychological effects on the children is often overlooked. In fact the case of Shaka is a great example of this. When people celebrate his life and contribution, they very seldom talk about the unhealthy circumstances that he grew up in. Instead, these circumstances are conveniently overshadowed by his achievements - a deliberate erasure of an unnecessary reality that has been normalised in present day society. Out of his dire circumstances, and with the help of a father figure and mentor in Dingiswayo, Shaka went on to make something of himself. But what of the many other children who may not have such a figure in their lives, how do they turn out?

There is a lot wrong with the ongoing vicious cycle of men who never had present fathers and do not know what it means to take responsibility. One of many great lessons we can learn from Shaka is to lead from the front. This means not being afraid to stick our necks out as men. We need to be okay with being exposed, with being vulnerable. And for this we need to be courageous. As we practice facing our problems we learn that while we can delegate responsibility, we cannot escape accountability.

Photo by Larry Crayton on Unsplash

The West African Influence on Music

This blog first appeared on Ubuntu Beats Radio - Beats by the people for the people.

It is no secret that music has been a notable part of African people's existence across the world. Music is the primary mechanism of retaining and disseminating culture, it has also served as a source of resistance against oppression in Africa. Throughout the ages in African societies, music has served in ways that reflect the people's beliefs and value systems.

Image: Harald Loquenz

This was no different in Western Africa, and  Kalakuta republic is where we kick off tracing the power of music. "Where?" you might ask - 14 Agege Motor Road, Idi-Oro, Mushin, Lagos, Nigeria is the answer. In the background you can hear electrifying music being performed by the father of Afrobeat - Fela Anikulapo Kuti. The music is a cry against the legacy of colonialism in the form of corruption, fear, brutality and apathy. Kalakuta republic, which gets its name from Calcutta prison in India where Fela served a sentence in 1974 for possessing marijuana, housed Fela and his family. It was more than just a residence - it was a theatre of dreams. Fela is reputed to have referred to it as a country on its own. Why Kalakuta you might wonder. Well, more than a thousand armed soldiers descended on Kalakuta republic on February 18 and assaulted those they found in Kalakuta. In a similar way that the colonial forces had done in other parts of Africa, the soldiers raped and looted the family compound and threw Fela's mother - a fall she never recovered from. Kalakuta is but only a microcosm of what was happening elsewhere on the continent. Despite the heavy repression and suppression the people experienced, Africa still gifted the world with more than just wonderful melodies and rhythms.

After studying music in London, Fela had returned to Lagos where highlife music was very popular. He went all out in search of avenues that would satisfy his musical talents and experimented with his own take of highlife music with Koola Lobitos, a band he founded with J.K. Braimah. Highlife had been made popular in Ghana from Trinidad’s calypso rhythms by the likes of E.T Mensah and The Tempos . It is characterised by jazzy horns and multiple guitars which lead the band, and got its name from the high class audience who enjoyed the music from select clubs. Ironically, the people outside those select clubs called it the highlife because they did not reach the class of the couples going inside. Some of the earliest bands to play highlife music include the likes of the Jazz Kings, Cape Coast Sugar Babies, and the Accra Orchestra. The genre spread via Ghanaian workers to Sierra Leone, Liberia, Nigeria and Gambia among other West African countries, where it quickly gained popularity. Some scholars have hailed it as the articulation of the zeitgeist. Ghana was important to Fela’s musical career because he first became popular there since the Ghanaian audience had an appetite for his variation of highlife music, which tended to lean toward jazz. Ghana also happens to be important for the liberation of the African continent as a whole because it is the first country on the continent to gain independence.

During the wave of independence across Africa, there was, and continues to be, a distinctive sound of music depending where you find yourself on the continent. Cuban rhythms prevailed in most French-speaking African countries. Leading groups in West Africa included the Star Band de Dakar (from Senegal), the Rail Band (Mali), and Bembeya Jazz National (Guinea). In central Africa, Grand Kalle and l’African Jazz, Franco’s O.K. Jazz, and Tabu Ley’s African Fiesta (in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, formerly Zaire) and Les Bantous (in the Republic of the Congo) were prominent. Each band had its own particular sound and style, but all were influenced by full-blown orchestras such as those of Johnny Pacheco and Orchestra Aragon and by the smaller, guitar-based groups of Cuban singer-songwriters such as Guillermo Portobales.

Beyond Kalakuta, in neighbouring Cameroon, a different sound to highlife was being heard courtesy of Manu Dibango. Manu was one of the pioneers of Afro-jazz in the 1970s. He blended American funk and traditional jazz with local Cameroonian rhythms to form a genre which would later influence many other musicians of his time and a younger generation of artists. Alongside the likes of South Africa’s Miriam Makeba and Ghana's Osibisa, he is among the great pioneers of African music.

Manu's life is a prime example that music is a great unifier because his parents came from separate ethnic groups and were tied up in song. Whether it was Congolese rumba in the 1950s, disco in the 1970s or hip-hop in the 1990s, his contribution to the development of modern music cannot be overstated. His 1972 hit, “Soul Makossa”, was yet another African example of music that connects people. The song, came at a time when Africa was caught between brutal military dictatorships and corrupt one-party dictatorships. Its vibes had unique cheerfulness and evoked a sense of cosmopolitanism that transcended borders. This is evidenced by the fact that Manu collaborated and played with musical talents from Herbie Hancock to Sinead O’Connor. The ease in which he merged different cultures through his music is what made his music have an international reach. Manu was a talented multi-instrumentalist who played the piano, mandolin and vibraphone, as well as the saxophone.

Of legends

I smiled when he said, "the future is in our hands", thinking to myself that there was nothing in those hardened hands. Somehow his words lingered on my for mind many moons thereafter. Each time they floated in my mind, as if they were a chant that cast me into a restless state of mind. It has been five years since that day.

Who was he?

Who is he?

My grandfather remains one of my most favourite people. He is late, but he still lives on in my memory. He lives.

His life story is one that leaves me smiling every time I hear about it or whenever something reminds me of him. He was a self-made man. He had no formal schooling but could articulate wise and carefully-considered thoughts and reflections. What really made him so loveable was his humility. He remains a great embodiment of being a family man. I think this is what made him a great man that he was.

My grandfather was a sangoma. He would often relate how difficult the path to him becoming isangoma was. In my young mind I remember wondering what could be difficult about learning how to use the herbs to heal ailments . Perhaps these thoughts were a result of what I had come to learn through a particular understanding of Christianity and westernisation, and how both shun the practice of ubungoma. For the great part of my adult life I have had inner conflict about this. A wrestle of self between what I was generally expected to be through a Christian and westernised society and a becoming and acceptance that I didn't know who I really was or coming to be. The polarisation between cultural beliefs and customs, and Christianity and westernisation was something I have tried to confront in a bid for enlightenment. This has been and continues to be a struggle.

I have felt so many emotions; from the helplessness at not knowing who or what you are, despair at not knowing where you come from, the futility of life in not knowing what your purpose is, the hope that sustains when the picture seems to come into focus, and to the unexplainable joy that stirs deep in one's belly when the universe assured you that you belong.

My grandfather taught me to treat everybody with love; a lesson I am learning to this day. I wish every child could have an experience with a loved one like I had with my grandfather. He was an embodiment of ubuntu, a true son of Afrika. His hands were hardened by love and sacrificed, and as such, I never felt their hardness because of the love in the human that carried them.

I am a troubled lover

Without conscious choice, I have been in deep reflection for a number of years. I have been reflecting because I am troubled by how to love better.  I can trace this trouble to many years ago. Back then, I had framed it as trying to understand what a life well lived is.

Love has been a continuous theme in my life. I learned early in my adult life that love is my greatest strength. More importantly, I learned that even in my broken self, I am love. I've pondered what it means  to love my wife, son, family, relatives, neighbours, community and the world at large - and how to do this really well. I've danced in the multiple shades of love and have had moments where I felt that I fully grasped it. And there have been many moments where I have acted in ways that show I have not. And so the dance continues.

And with the river of life and time forever flowing I have learned to be. To be in life. To be in love. To be in the moment. It has been a journey of learning, and a lot of unlearning. I have struggled to grasp the many contradictions in my life and in the world - to love myself despite the flaws I observe in me, to reconcile the wrong with the right, and move beyond good intentions to meaningful engagement.

I am grateful for life. Without it I wouldn't have this trouble.

Mother