Pela Simba - Pela Simba (2006)

Hello everybody, Babe(b)logue goes on holiday, so this will be the last post for a while. See you soon, and stick around!

Radu.

P.S. As far as I know, this somewhat mysterious CD collects two beautiful Pela Simba’s albums originally published during the first half of the 80’s, Pela Simba and Sambara. If you discover more info, please leave a comment here. Cheers!

«Pela Simba, chanteur-guitariste d'origine congolaise, fondateur du groupe Thu Zahina, neveu de Tabu Ley (l'un des pères de la musique africaine moderne), vous propose une musique ethno-urbaine où s'enroulent tout en couleur poésie, rythmes, chants et joie de vivre.
Thu Zahina” est le nom d’un groupe musical qui fait parler de lui au Zaïre dans les années soixante dix. C’est le premier groupe composé uniquement de lycéens. Parmi les cofondateurs de “Thu Zahina” il y a Pela Simba.
Très vite populaire chez les jeunes, ce groupe, avec son style nouveau, fait naître dans son sillage d’autres groupes de lycéens tels que “Zatko”, “Bella Bella”, “Stukas” et bien d’autres.
Dès le départ, “Thu Zahina” se trouve un parrain de choix en la personne de l’artiste Tabu Ley (Rochereau). En effet ce dernier: chanteur et auteur-compositeur, est l’une des plus grandes stars du Zaïre et d’Afrique. Quelques temps plus tard ce groupe de lycéens est produit par Luambo-Makiadi dit “Franco”, une autre grande star du pays et du continent africain. L’arrivée de “Thu Zahina” et de tous ces autres groupes est sans conteste le départ d’une nouvelle musique zaïroise. C’est le début des artistes comme Papa Wemba, Pépé Manuku, Evoloko. Nyoka Longo,...
Après son départ du groupe “Thu Zahina”, Pela crée les “Saphirs” et ensuite rejoint Pépé Kallé, Vata Mombassa dans le groupe “Myosotis”.
En 1977, Pela arrive à Paris pour des études d’audiovisuel et de journalisme qu’il terminera quelques années plus tard avec succès. Mais ses études ne l’empêchent pas de continuer de vivre sa passion: la musique. C’est ainsi qu’il consacre ses heures de liberté à la création de l’une des premières formations musicales, d’étudiants d’Afrique Centrale.
Avec Jean-Faustin Missamou et Aimé Kobo ils fondent les “Mongali”.
Quelques années plus tard, avec Maika et Bony Bikaye, Pela joue aux côtés de Ray Lema dans le groupe “Carma” sponsorisé par Jean-François Bizot et son journal “Actuel”.
Puis toujours avec Maika, c’est la naissance du groupe “Malaika” avec des musiciens comme Denis Hekimian, Manou Lima ou le saxophone Jimi Mvondo.
En tant qu’auteur, compositeur, arrangeur ou interprète, Pela participe à un grand nombre de disques avec des artistes de renom tels que Tabu Ley, Mbilia Bel, Franco, Tchounou Bowen...
En 1986, on lui confie la direction artistique du “Kiss Club”. Il en fait très vite un haut lieu de la musique black et métisse à Paris. On s’y presse tous les soirs pour y rencontrer des artistes connus ou inconnus; et danser et chanter sur des rythmes de toutes les couleurs.
Pendant deux ans Pela et son groupe le “Mouvement AYE” s’y produisent tous les soirs. Et les invités pour “taper le boeuf” seront pas les moindres: Higelin, Eric Serrat, Alpha Blondy, Rido Bayonne, etc.
Pela s’est produit dans de nombreux lieux réputés de la nuit parisienne tels que “Le Bataclan”, “La Chapelle des Lombards”, “Le Rex Club”, “L’espace Cardin”, etc. et dans un grand nombre de villes hors de Paris.» (EspaceConcert)

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Marabi Africa (2007)

«Marabi is the independant label created in 2002 by Christian Mousset, director of the Festival Musiques Métisses d'Angoulême in France.The festival, place of exchange and discovery, is widely opened to urban popular musics from the African Continent, Indian Ocean, the Caribbeans, America. Marabi is mainly a discographic extension of this event. On the same artistic line, the label puts upcoming artists forward as well as patrimonial leading figures. Marabi is the name given to the South African Jazz born in the townships of the thirties.

Marabi Africa is a compilation between blues from the Sahel and the Indian Ocean, Congolese rumba, Zulu beat, flamboyant Mandingo guitars, featuring awesome groove and melancholy songs. 17 tracks, modern yet permeated by the colours of tradition, take you on a musical journey into the heart of the African continent, with its divas, its troubadours, its “rockers” and its exceptional instrumentalists...» (Mondomix)

Featuring tracks from Malouma, Ba Cissoko, Boubacar Traoré, Djelimady Tounkara, Bembeya Jazz, Sékou “Bembeya” Diabaté, Mahotella Queens, Johnny Clegg, Gizavo-Mhlanga-Mirandon, Jaoyoby, Granmoun Lélé, Nathalie Natiembé, Menwar, Rajery, Rumbanella Band, Wendo Kolosoy & Ballaké Sissoko.

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Ray Lema - Paradox (2007)

«Recorded in a trio with bass-guitarist Etienne Mbappe and drummer Francis Lassus, Ray Lema’s new album, Paradox, is an eclectic mix of language and genre. It is hardly surprising to find such diversity from a musician who has always been frustrated by pigeonholes.

RFI Musique: Let’s talk about a word that you seem fond of, “paradox”, since it is the title you gave your album.
Ray Lema: We live in a society full of paradoxes right now, in the sense that the all right analyses have been made, but we act in complete contradiction with what these analyses are teaching and showing us. Take cigarettes, for example. […] This type of paradox weighs me down. I say to myself, how can society be so advanced and so childish at the same time?

Is there also a paradox in being a musician today?
It is important to separate the stardom from the musicians. As a musician, you want to make music that produces a little, indescribable joy, but to be a star, you have to get yourself dressed up to be a consumer product and join a process that us musicians cannot always control. So yes, there is some kind of paradox there.

For a musician like you, who sees the sense in maintaining French-speaking communities, isn’t it a paradox to sing in English as you do on some of the tracks on your album?
No, because I am married to an American and we speak English at home. So, although I am a Francophone, I can be an Anglophone too. It isn’t a paradox; it’s a reality for quite a few world citizens today.

This album includes a track you wrote in homage to Ali Farka Touré and a cover version of "C’est une Garonne", which you wrote for Claude Nougaro. Are these acts of friendship or remembrance?
Both. Each was a personal friend of mine and had something to teach me. With Claude, I learned my command of the French language. […] As for Ali, we saw each other at festivals, but we had never really hit it off, until one day, we found ourselves at the same show in Brazil. Jorge Ben Jor had invited us both to his concert (Angélique Kidjo was there too). Ali said to me, “When I look at you, sometimes you are really white and sometimes you are really African.” This was news! “We’ll talk about it,” he said. And so he invited me to his house, in Niafunké in Mali. He talked to me a lot about African culture there, and taught me a lot. These two guys were friends of mine, but at the same time, I owe them a gesture of remembrance because they brought some fantastic things to me.» (RFI Musique)

A full English bio here

Biografia in italiano qui

Official Website here

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Lokua Kanza - Wapi Yo (1995)

Pascal Lokua Kanza was born in Zaire, the first of eight children. After his father died tragically while captaining a ship at sea, Kanza helped provide for his family by taking part-time jobs while he was still in school. Setting aside a few hours each day to teach himself guitar, he soon began playing with friends in local bands. As he got older, his approach to music grew more serious. After studying at the Kinshasa Music Conservatory and performing with Abeti in Zaire, Kanza moved to the Ivory Coast for a fresh start. For three years, he played guitar and handled vocal duties for a handful of African bar bands. After being accepted to Paris' prestigious CIM, Kanza moved there to study jazz and was given the opportunity to perform with many of his role models. Working with Franky Vincent, La Mafia, Ray Lema, and Papa Wemba, Kanza continued to carve out his own style while making valuable connections. In 1991, he joined the Soul Makossa Gang after adopting his middle name as his performance moniker. 1992 saw Kanza debut his own material, first in a performance with Angélique Kidjo and later on his first solo offering. Intent on honoring his musical heritage, Kanza crafted an album of honest and intimate songs in a small studio, while keeping post-production to a minimum. The accolades that followed helped Kanza attract the attention of Youssou N'Dour, who invited Kanza to sing on Womat. In 1994, he reunited with Papa Wemba at Peter Gabriel's Real World Studios to lend his talents on Emotion. His experiences that year culminated at the African Music Awards when in December, he was awarded Best African Album for his solo debut. In 1995 Kanza released his second effort, Wapi Yo. After working with Geoffrey Oryema later that year, Kanza picked up his second African Music Award. In 1998, he appeared on Natalie Merchant's Ophelia and began work on his third album. 3 expanded where Wapi Yo left off, featuring a broader, more orchestral sound. In 2002, he returned to subtlety, releasing Toyebi Te'. Although the folk-tinged album was a more restrained affair than 3, Kanza brought in a variety of guests to lend their talents.» (AMG)

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African Blues (World Music Network, 1998)

«Blues? That’s American Deep South stuff, right? Well, not only. The quest for “authenticity” in music has taken so many spurious turns in recent years that it has perhaps managed to overlook the overarching patterns. It’s these patterns that have made up the blues, that inimitable form of misery set to music that’s as vibrant today as ever. It has a long history – musicologists have traced the origins of blues from India to Arabia to Spain, through to Africa, the Caribbean and America’s southern states.

African Blues, a valuable and exhilarating record, contains 15 songs ranging from Egypt’s Hamza El Din to Cape Verde’s unsurpassable Cesaria Evora. The Stayin’ Home With the Blues series, meanwhile, features vintage recordings with American blues artists such as Freddie King, Big Bill Bronzy, Lightnin’ Hopkins and Memphis Slim.

Although blues has its origins elsewhere, it’s the American records, made mostly in the 1940s and 1950s, that sound spare and dour. It’s impossible to say the same of African musician Ismael Lo’s “Talibe” with its sweetly sad vocals and lilting rhythms, or the mesmerizing progression of Oumou Sangare’s “Saa Magni”. But listen more closely and the connections become clearer: there’s something of Otis Redding about Kante Manfila and Balla Kall’s “Kankan Blues” from Guinea, and there’s a distinct doo-wop groove in the oldest track on the disc, Zambian Alick Nhata’s “Maggie”.

Turn to Lightnin’ Hopkins’ “Sad news from Korea” – a 1950s song which shows how well the old blues format adapts to accommodate new subjects – and we begin to hear the same kinds of empty spaces, quivering with expression, as in songs like “A Va Safy Va Lomo” from Mozambique’s Orchestra Marrabenta Star.

Blues has its sound roots in the music that the American slaves brought from Africa and its emotional roots in the experience of captivity. And African Blues is fascinating because it traces not only roots, but is made by musicians who have already been exposed to American Blues, especially in its soul and R’n’B incarnations.

But how authentic is that typical no-good-woman blues sentiment that the Stayin’ Home album has in abundance? Without knowing the languages it’s difficult to know whether misogyny prevails in African Blues. But it is intriguing to reflect on Cesaria Evora, the barefoot diva who slugs back whisky and smokes with the best of them, and who has by virtue of her Portuguese-language songs been enlisted into the ranks of fado – Portuguese blues – singers. Whatever the roots of blues, its routes through the world continue apace.» (New Internationalist)

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African Party Volume 1 (1966-1968)

Hello everybody! I’m leaving for a brief holiday, but I’m not gonna leave you thirsty for music, ‘cause this is a real gem, which I am sure will be in heavy rotation in your mp3 player for the whole summer! So, have fun with the African Party!

See ya soon, Radu

«In the nineteen-seventies, many quality recordings of classic Congolese bands were issued in the AFRICAN 360 series, distributed by SonoDisc of Paris. […] The lack of recording information, beyond titles and composers of songs and occasionally licensing, frustrates any attempts at scholarship but foregrounds the music, which is consistently great. The attitude of the label was very much like that seen in the “Colonie Belge” genre of Congolese paintings which showed the superior whites treating the Africans like wayward children, humiliating and punishing them. […] This brutal attitude even permeates the music where the 360 series was concerned. A fragile and rare treasure of the world's music was bungled, mishandled and tossed off by the French publishers. Clearly they didn't give un crotte.

The oldest archive of Congolese music in Europe (dating from the 1950s) belonged to Editions Ngoma, who recorded in Léopoldville but pressed their records in France. According to (Congolese music historian/biographer) Vincent Luttman, around 1961 Fonior (a subsidiary of the Decca Records empire) began issuing 45s of the orchestra African Jazz on Decca for European and African (non-Congolese) release. This deal was set up by Grand Kalle – where Fonior paid for and held the recordings, but granted Kalle license for release in Congo under his own editions label “Surboum AJ”. The European- and Congolese-pressed editions differed, using different artwork and catalogue numbers throughout. Around 1963-65 Decca also began reissuing some of these 45T as a series of 4 track 45T EPs. At this time the only artists to appear on the European editions produced by Fonior/Decca were African Jazz, OK Jazz, African Fiesta, Loup Jazz and Pierre Rasins (Antilles-based artist).

By 1967-8 Fonior (by then semi-independent of Decca) were distributing Congolese records on many smaller Congolese labels (Editions Boboto, Paka Siye, etc) and these later became the mainstay of the early African 45T catalogue (being repressed and re-issued as the 90xxxx 45T series from around 1968-ish on. These re-issues were primarily made for European-Francophone markets and African (non-Congo) distribution.

The 360 series of LP releases began to appear from around 1966-67 (the first ten releases only – with the series beginning properly from around 1969), and were either LP's licensed directly from Congolese labels (see Izeidi below) or were compiled (in later releases) from previously licensed 45Ts taken from the labels 90 series.

When the once mighty Ngoma label collapsed in the early 1970s, Fonior secured the rights to their catalogue and began integrating previous Ngoma product into their African (LP & 45T) series, repackaging them and issuing them with new Editions African 90xxx or 360xxx catalogue numbers.

The African 360 series of LPs also added to their catalog from the (Fonior-owned) Fiesta label. Fiesta was begun in the early 1970's (1971-73) and concentrated on releasing non-Congolese 33T including a number of Camerounian artists (Manu Dibango's Soul Makossa being their most famous 45T). Congolese artists however did sometimes appear on editions Fiesta 45T (as did a number of Middle-Eastern artists) including many works by both OK Jazz (licensed from Franco's Editions Populaire) and Negro Succes.

As stated above, back in 1961 Decca licensed their Congolese recordings to Fonior in Brussels for sale in Belgium. Fonior also sometimes pressed records for Loningisa and Esengo. According to Gary Stewart, in Rumba On The River, the technically superior Fonior studios in Brussels became the site of pilgrimage for African artists, beginning with Kalle and African Jazz, with whom Manu recorded his first sessions. The musicians would go into the studio and work until they had recorded over forty songs. Some had already been composed, but a great many were written in the studio. Manu's biography (7 Kilos Of Coffee) gives a unique account of this spontaneous composition and recording process. The pay for 40 songs was usually about $200 to share among band members who would sometimes collapse from hunger or fatigue during these long, arduous sessions.

As the 1960's progressed into the 1970s, the once profitable Decca recording empire began to decline. By the mid-1970s the decline became terminal. Fonior struggled on, licensing product from the 'new wave' of Congolese artists (Veve, Zaiko, LipuaLipua, Stukas, etc) as well as retaining links with the old guard (Franco/Rochereau/Izeidi, etc), but by the late 1970s the African catalogue already contained many gaps. The production of African 45T seems to have ended around 1978, although the LP series continued. In those later years poor pressing/mastering facilities also meant that when 45T records were pressed/repressed there were many faulty discs – this probably accounts for the decline and abandon of the 45T singles catalogue. Finally Fonior went into bankruptcy in 1981 and its entire catalogue was purchased by Sonodisc for a nominal fee.

Sonodisc was formed in 1970 by two former employees of Ngoma (the Congolese label that operated a pressing plant in France), Marcel Perse and Michel David. They left Ngoma with contacts and even recordings but mainly acted as distributors of Umm Kalthum records from Egypt and some from the Caribbean. When the Fonior catalogue went to Sonodisc for a pittance, Franco, Tabu Ley & Verckys sued to regain control over their recordings but were over-ruled in court. Token payments were made to them, but no other African artist ever received a sou for their music which was now in the hands of Sonodisc. […]

The AFRICAN 360 series has two main sub-categories: L'Afrique Danse and Les Merveilles du Passé. Both focus on mid-60s to mid-70s Zairean popular music. There is also a 425 series of modern releases. […] The mainstays of the AFRICAN 360 catalogue are, naturally enough, the most popular artists from Congo (Zaire): "Franco" (Luambo Makiadi), "Docteur Nico" (Kassanda wa Mikalay), "Rochereau" (Tabu Ley Pascal), Kiamuangana Verckys, and Camerounian multi-instrumentalist Manu Dibango.» (Muzikifan – click for much more!)

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Docteur Nico & l'Orchestre African Fiesta (1975)

«Hailed throughout Africa as "le Dieu de la Guitare," Nicolas Kasanda was born of Baluba parentage on 7 July 1939 in Mikalayi in the Kasai province of the then Belgian Congo. His father played accordion. In 1950, aged 11, Nico was introduced to Opika Studios by his cousin Tino Baroza and older brother Mwamba Déchaud who were session musicians there. At 14, he joined Joseph Kabaselle's African Jazz. In 1957 he took up electric guitar and can be heard playing electric guitar on 'Sophie ya motema,' recorded in 1960. In 1961 he temporarily split with Kabaselle and formed African Jazz Aile Nico before returning to Kabaselle in 1962 and 1963. (Vincent Luttman cautions that some of the early Surboum African Jazz recordings of this period thought to be featuring Nico are played by Tino Barozo. Luttman also points out, very perceptively, that Nico's later signature choppy guitar style when he is chording behind a vocalist, is based on Manu Dibango's piano technique: which was his own unique version of the montuno piano style he brought to collaborations with Kabaselle.) Young Nicolas Kasanda graduated with honours from high school and went on to college, while keeping his night job as Leopoldville's hottest young guitarist. He taught auto mechanics at the Christian Brothers school in N'djili district, Kinshasa, which earned him the nickname 'Docteur.'

Nico quit teaching and broke away from African Jazz to form African Fiesta in 1963 with Tabu Ley Rochereau, brother Déchaud, Kwamy, Mujos, Depuissant on conga and bassist Joseph Mwena. The band was joined by Roger's brother Faugus Izeidi on third guitar, with Paul Mizele and a Congolese woman singer (with a Greek name) Photas Myosotis ("Forget-me-not") on vocals; Dominique "Willy" Kuntima doubled Jeef Mingiedi on trumpet. [Information from Gary Stewart's book Rumba On The River.] When Rochereau split in 1965 to form African Fiesta National, Nico reformed his group as African Fiesta Sukisa, which existed until 1973. They ruled the roost in the late sixties, with endless hits. However, in 1969, the entire band, except his brother Déchaud, walked out because they felt they weren't getting their due. Nico quickly assembled a new band that included Josky Kiambukuta and Lessa Lassan on vocals. Bopol Mansiamina joined on guitar in 1970 and they kept it together for a few more years. Success eluded Docteur Nico in later life and he drank heavily, leading to his early death in a Belgian hospital on 22 September 1985. His improvisations are so surprisingly fluid and ecstatic that he truly earned the nickname 'God of the Guitar.' » (Muzikifan – Click for an almost complete discography)

This outing was originally released in 1967 (with sides reversed) under the title African Fiesta sous la direction du Docteur Nico

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The Sound of Kinshasa - Guitar Classics from Zaire (1995)

«Most of the great Afropop styles have grown out of a joining of urban and rural ideas, of indigenous roots and foreign borrowings. The story of Congolese pop music provides a complex and powerful example. By the closing years of the Belgian Congo, the city of Leopoldville (today's Kinshasa) was a place where city boys plucked out highlife songs on box guitars, phonographs and radios played the latest mambo and son hits from Cuba, and people from deep in the Congo's remote, culturally rich interior came to seek opportunity. Pop bands mainly existed to entertain the white elite, and played imitations of foreign music. The Cuban music, with African (including Congolese) rhythmic ideas at its heart, was naturally familiar and attractive to local musicians and listeners. So when musicians in Leopoldville began to make electric pop music for themselves, that music provided an obvious starting point.

Greek-run record labels – Ngoma, Olympia, and Opika – were the first to produce local records during the 1940s. But by the time African labels, Loningisa, and later Veve, entered the game, something had happened to the music. The Cuban piano parts had been adapted to guitars, and in the process, the cycling, polyrhythmic qualities of traditional Congo music, especially that of the sanza hand piano, had changed the color of the guitar parts. Gradually, guitar would emerge as the dominant melodic and harmonic instrument in Congo bands. The biggest bands in the 1970s and 80s would typically feature three guitars, and sometimes as many as five, all playing different, interlocking parts.

Vocalists sang in Lingala, a composite language developed during the years when the Belgians used laborers of diverse ethnicities to build a cross-continental railroad. The language had a warm, liquid flow, and the singers were excellent soloists and harmonists. When the Belgian Congo became an independent, nation in 1960, the new capital, Kinshasa, was alive with a beautiful, new hybrid sound unlike anything else in the world.» (Read more on Afropop)

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Franco et le T.P. OK Jazz - Originalité: The Original 1956 Recordings (1956)

«Dopo il mercato centrale di Kasavubu, Matongé è il cuore pulsante di Kinshasa, città di 4 milioni di abitanti [nel 1978] suddivisi in 400 etnie, capitale di un paese grande quattro volte l’Italia che ha conosciuto grandi sconvolgimenti sociali e una lunga dittatura. […] Matongé è la valvola che lascia sfiatare il vapore, una zona d’ironia libera per non impazzire. La musica zairese contemporanea è nata a Matongé, tra concessioni labirintiche e palazzoni di cemento. Una Corte dei Miracoli dove si trova di tutto per pochi soldi. […] La musica impazza dalle ngandas, taverne locali, e dagli altoparlanti dei negozietti straripanti di cassette pirata. Ma soprattutto, a partire da un’ora scandalosamente tarda, i club si trasformano in fornaci che sera dopo sera consumano i nuovi successi facendoli entrare nella leggenda. […]

In questo universo dadaista, violento e passionale, intrallazzone e generoso […] durar è un’impresa eroica. Sicché Luambo Makiadi Lokanga La Dju Penè François, alias “Franco”, fa parte dei miti. esordisce negli anni ’50 sulle orme del chitarrista zairese Tino Barosa, mago dello stile patengué, un compromesso tra pachanga (post cha-cha-cha) e merengue (salsa dominicana), poi firma una rumba dal ritmo rapido, la famosa rumba odemba, arricchita di elementi folkloristici e pompata da una tecnica di chitarra che ricama su due note intorno a un tema che prima veniva dato dalla kalimba tradizionale, una sanza locale. Per affrontare l’impresa, Franco si serve di un pezzo da novanta, l’OK Jazz […] un ensemble con cui questo figlio del Basso Congo immagina una combinazione di ritmi locali e influenze cubane su uno sfondo di loquacità popolare che partorirà decenni di grandi successi. […]

Nel 1965 una “rogna” politico-finanziaria manda al tappeto la giovanissima orchestra; Franco salva gli strumenti dagli artigli dei creditori e fa rinascere il complesso con il nome di TPOK Jazz, da “Tout-Puissant OK Jazz” (“Onnipotente OK Jazz”), un modo per affermare un’ambizione smodata. Questa rinascita segna l’inizio di un’incredibile competizione con altre formazioni, in particolare quella dell’Africa Fiesta National guidata dall’estroso Tabu-Ley Rocherau, erede stilistico del grande Kabaselé. […]

Tuttavia, la longevità del successo di Franco è dovuta al suo talento di cronista della vita sociale e alla sua verve satirica […] molte sue canzoni testimoniano una propensione alla morale che seduce il pubblico popolare. […] Franco […] è di fibra plebea. Attraverso i suoi avi tetela, ngombé e ngoma incarna una percezione meticciata del mondo congolese. Un vissuto che gli permette di cantare fuori dai denti il rigore di una società travagliata dalla cupidigia dei potenti, dalla crisi economica, dall’onnipresente bustarella […] una società di cui si perdono i valori. […]» (Frank Tenaille, Lo swing del camaleonte, Epoché, pp. 69-73)

«Of all the fabled dance bands in Africa, OK Jazz stand out for the quality of music, the quantity of output and their pan-African influence. The band was pre-eminent in African music for more than 30 years, linking the first generation of Congo rumba with the later exuberance of Zairean soukous.

This great musical institution [which was to become known as 'l'academie de la musique congolaise moderne'], was founded on June 6, 1956 when Franco, 'De la Lune' Daniel Lubelo (rh.gtr), Jean Serge Essous (sax), Bosuma Dessouin (conga), Pandi Saturnin (perc), Landot Philipe 'Rossignol' (vcl) Roitelet Munganya (bass) and some friends played their first dance under the name of OK Jazz in Kinshasa (Leopoldville).

The musicians were all session players at Loningisa studios where they had been tutored and directed by the guitarist Henri Bowane. As well as playing in the house band, Bana Loningisa (Loningisa Boys), most had released 78rpm records and had already scored several hits before they started as a gigging band. When they recorded these tracks later in 1956, the singers Vicky Longomba and Edo Nganga had joined. The following year, Antoine Armando Brazzo added his guitar accompaniment.

Franco had joined Loningisa in 1953 at the age of 15, initially playing with Dewayon and the Watam band. “At the time I was skinny, just a kid who played guitar which we called Libaku ya nguma (a hollow-bodied electrified guitar known as a 'lucky break') and the guitar was bigger than me.” He made such an impression that he was signed to a 10-year contract. Franco became Congo's first true pop star, sponsored to model clothes, endorsing products and enjoying a huge fan club. Musicians contracted to the record label were not supposed to work outside studio time, but in 1956 the Loningisa boys formally organised themselves into a working band, sponsored by Oscar Kashama, owner of the OK Bar. They still recorded under the names of individual members, while accompanists were also credited, sometimes as 'ensemble OK Jazz'.

Track 1, En Entre OK, On Sort KO, was a theme song and slogan for the band in which all the members are introduced. Considering its content, this can be counted as the debut release of Africa's greatest orchestra. Subsequent releases came regularly every few weeks, although the band's personnel shifted frequently. A major reshuffle occurred in 1957 but, throughout many upheavals and power struggles, Franco became established as the accepted leader. Loningisa closed down before Congo's independence in 1960, but OK Jazz evolved into a massive organisation and Franco' s personal reputation was never equalled. Throughout the 1960s, 70s and 80s, OK Jazz was the yardstick for African dance music. And this is where it all started.» (Retroafric, read more)

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Grand Kallé & L'African Jazz - Succès des Années 50/60 (2002)

«[…] Nato a Matadi nel 1930, [Joseph Kabaselé] frequenta i corsi di musica dei cori cattolici, come quasi tutti gli artisti del Congo belga. […] Bocciato in terza media per cattiva condotta, nel 1949 l’adolescente Kabaselé entra a far parte di un gruppo vocale, La voix de la concorde, poi si lascia alle spalle le canzoni religiose per dedicarsi alla rumba afrocubana, uno stile musicale ricco di virtuosismi e più in sintonia con il futuro che immagina per sé.

Tra il 1950 e il 1960 la musica dei due Congo (Congo Brazzaville e Congo Léopoldville) vive un momento cardine della sua storia. Nelle capitali e su entrambe le rive del grande fiume collegate dal traghetto nasce una musica che aggrega danze e canti rurali tradizionali, ritmi dell’Africa occidentale (high-life) o europei (come la polka pizzicata), influenze di fanfare dei coloni e canti di cori religiosi. I gruppi si moltiplicano intorno agli spacci di bevande, i congo-bar, e nasce un’industria musicale. L’elettrificazione degli strumenti, l’influenza del jazz e della musica importata dai Caraibi fanno nascere il famoso crogiolo musicale dell’Africa centrale, la cui figura di spicco sarà proprio il «Tino Rossi congolese».

In questo contesto, la nascita dell’orchestra African Jazz, dove Kabaselé ha coinvolto i suoi amici d’infanzia, rappresenta l’atto fondatore di un’estetica nuova: l’orchestra sarà il simbolo del cambiamento radicale della musica, ieri ampiamente legata a rituali collettivi, oggi finalizzata all’intrattenimento. L’importanza degli African Jazz consiste nel fatto che portano alla luce i gusti latenti di un pubblico cittadino in rotta con le abitudini di campagna, esprimono il multiculturalismo delle etnie presenti nella capitale e rielaborano le influenze straniere, in particolar modo quelle cubane (rumba, pachanga, cha-cha-cha), di cui Kabaselé è appassionato. […]» (Frank Tenaille, Lo swing del camaleonte, Epoché, pp. 17-18)

«Most of the great Afropop styles have grown out of a joining of urban and rural ideas, of indigenous roots and foreign borrowings. The story of Congolese pop music provides a complex and powerful example. By the closing years of the Belgian Congo, the city of Leopoldville (today's Kinshasa) was a place where city boys plucked out highlife songs on box guitars, phonographs and radios played the latest mambo and son hits from Cuba, and people from deep in the Congo's remote, culturally rich interior came to seek opportunity. Pop bands mainly existed to entertain the white elite, and played imitations of foreign music. The Cuban music, with African (including Congolese) rhythmic ideas at its heart, was naturally familiar and attractive to local musicians and listeners. So when musicians in Leopoldville began to make electric pop music for themselves, that music provided an obvious starting point.

Greek-run record labels (Ngoma, Olympia, and Opika) were the first to produce local records during the 1940s. But by the time African labels, Loningisa, and later Veve, entered the game, something had happened to the music. The Cuban piano parts had been adapted to guitars, and in the process, the cycling, polyrhythmic qualities of traditional Congo music, especially that of the sanza hand piano, had changed the colour of the guitar parts. Gradually, guitar would emerge as the dominant melodic and harmonic instrument in Congo bands. The biggest bands in the 1970s and 80s would typically feature three guitars, and sometimes as many as five, all playing different, interlocking parts.

Vocalists sang in Lingala, a composite language developed during the years when the Belgians used labourers of diverse ethnicities to build a cross-continental railroad. The language had a warm, liquid flow, and the singers were excellent soloists and harmonists. When the Belgian Congo became an independent, nation in 1960, the new capital, Kinshasa, was alive with a beautiful, new hybrid sound unlike anything else in the world.

Joseph Kabasele (a.k.a. Le Grand Kalle) and his band African Jazz heralded independence with the song "Independence Cha Cha." Kalle had a sweet, pure solo voice that inspired many imitators. But major credit for the band's massive popularity also goes to guitarist Nicolas "Dr Nico" Kasanda, a descendent of the Luba people of central Zaire like many of Congolese music's great contributors. […]» (Afropop, read the full story)

«Joseph Kabasele Tshamala was born 1930, Matadi, Zaire. The father of modern Zairean music, Kalle's earliest musical experiences were as a member of the church choir in his home town of Matadi. Moving to Kinshasa in 1950, he worked with Orchestre De Tendence Congolaise, a band that specialized in acoustic polka and mazurka rhythms, derived from records brought to the country by colonial settlers. In 1953, keen to develop a genuinely Congolese style, he formed African Jazz, based on the Afro-Cuban tradition and in particular the rumba, samba and cha cha, all played in a distinctively Congolese fashion. Over the years, the group included many of the future stars of Zairean music, including Dr. Nico and Tabu Ley, and provided a training ground for the next generation of Zairean musicians.» (PanafricanAllstars)

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Konono N° 1 - Congotronics (2004)

«This amazing record is the product of utility, coincidence, and accidental discovery as much as it is a product of academic deliberation, and it manages to sound old and traditional even as it is refreshingly (even radically) new and avant-garde. Konono No. 1 was formed in the 1980s by a group of Bazombo musicians, dancers, and singers from the Democratic Republic of Congo to play traditional likembe (thumb piano) music in the streets. They soon discovered, though, that they needed amplification to be heard and – this is where the story of this album really begins – they took a DIY and utilitarian approach by building their own amplification systems out of junked car parts, magnets, and other flotsam. Once assembled, the system produced a huge hum that Konono No. 1 embraced as part of the sound of the group. At the center of everything were three amped-up thumb pianos tuned to three different registers, and coupled with all manner of pots, pans, whistles, and brake drum snares for percussion and with the vocals blasting through megaphones, all embedded in the huge buzz and hum of the homemade PA system, the group accidentally created a sound that was at once both ancient and traditional and yet eerily akin to experimental 21st century electronica. Congotronics is Konono's second album (the first was a live outing entitled Lubuaku), and while it was ostensibly recorded in a studio setting, it sounds wonderfully live and immediate, as if the dozen members of the group were standing on a busy street corner like some Congolese version of a second-line Mardi Gras band, only with thumb pianos instead of horns. Musical themes emerge and reemerge in the various tracks, and what sounds initially chaotic and random is revealed to be nothing of the sort, giving the whole album the feel of a ragged, joyous suite. Part traditional, part African rhumba, part smart avant-garde electronica, Congotronics is the sound of an urban junkyard band simultaneously weaving the past and the future into one amazingly coherent structure, and not only that, you can dance to it. This is the band Tom Waits has been looking for all his life.» (AMG)

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Putumayo Presents: Acoustic Africa (2006)

«While the market for African music is heavy with new forms of Afro-pop, synth-driven reggae, and piles of high-energy soukous, there is a movement afoot for music in the more restrained end of the spectrum. Acoustic Africa takes a stab at compiling some of the newer sounds of this movement, à la MTV Unplugged. There are a few names on the album with massive recognition value: Angélique Kidjo presents a song to be released on a future album of her own, Habib Koité has his old hit "Baro," and Djelimady Tounkara (from the Super Rail Band, among others) contributes a recent piece for the guitar. Moving away from West Africa, South Africa's old master Vusi Mahlasela contributes a nice work for the guitar as well. Aside from these better-known artists, though, the real joy of this album comes from the unheard of, or at least less heard of. Senegal's Diogal has a gentle touch on the guitar, as does Madagascar's Rajery on the valiha (with a mangled hand and a technical style similar to Django Reinhardt's old playing technique). While Lokua Kanza has had a bit of fame outside of the Congo, Faya Tess is somewhat less known outside of Africa – on this album they combine for an uncharacteristically (for her, at least) somber piece. Laye Sow's gentle approach to protest music and a pair of works from the Cape Verdean repertoire fill out a relatively diverse set quite well. While North and East Africa, and indeed most of the central and southern portions, are underrepresented, the album covers the acoustic movement well, and touches upon the acoustic tips of more electronically based styles as well. The music is top-notch without exception, and the performers make a nice grab bag of exploration for the intrepid listener.» (AMG)

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