African sound to echo between Durban and Dakar
SENEGALESE legend Baaba Maal and South African stalwart Madala Kunene will add their world famous voices to the Play Your Part Africa Live Stream Concert tomorrow.
They will stream from Dakar and Durban, respectively, before Thandiswa Mazwai takes to the stage at Constitution Hill.
Born in 1953 into a large family of fishermen in the Fouta town of Podor, Maal studied music in Dakar, the capital of Senegal, and Paris, France, before embarking on a two-year musical pilgrimage around West Africa with his longtime friend Mansour Seck.
He then recorded his first albums with Seck, including the desert blues classic Djam Leelii.
Since the 1980s, Maal has released a series of solo albums and toured the world numerous times.
His recent album The Traveller represented both a new direction musically, and a powerful summary of his life’s work. The Traveller’s themes of communication, reconciliation and responsibility chime with Maal’s work campaigning for women’s rights and children’s education, and speaking out on the effects of climate change on the continent.
Kunene is commonly referred to as the king of the Zulu guitar. He is an artist who is constantly shifting between musical habitats. He has no interest in genre specifications and prescriptions.
Instead, his brand of blues operates in an opaque space where cool jazz, maskandi, mbaqanga, and a myriad of East Coast blues intersect.
He started busking on Durban’s beachfront at the age of 7, making his first guitar out of a cooking oil tin and fish gut for strings, soon becoming a popular performer in the townships.
“Music is the best medium to record and tell history. As African people, the way we know and understand our past is very influenced by music,” Kunene says.
“So if I can add one layer of context that can help in understanding this period in our history, then that is great.”
The commemoration of Africa Day this year, comes at a time when the world finds itself at the centre of a deadly pandemic that has made it essential for nations to stand together in the fight to curb the spread of Covid-19.
Through the Play Your Part Africa Live Stream Concert, Brand SA and the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture will use artistic activism to pay tribute to Africans united in their plight against Covid-19 and celebrate Africa’s strength in adversity.
Bassline Live, which has been behind many notable gigs and festivals for the past 25 years, will be producing the free streamed concert.
The show can be watched for free at 8pm on skyroomlive.com