tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/africa-grammy-119032/articlesAfrica Grammy – The Conversation2022-03-02T14:26:29Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1782302022-03-02T14:26:29Z2022-03-02T14:26:29ZThe legacy of iconic singer Miriam Makeba and her art of activism<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/449553/original/file-20220302-19-vs81hr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo by James Andanson/Sygma via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>South Africa’s world famous singer and activist <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/miriam-makeba">Miriam Makeba</a> (1932-2008) would have turned 90 on 4 March 2022. Born Zenzile Miriam Makeba in Johannesburg’s Prospect township, she had a life of remarkable global impact. She contributed to black people’s struggle for liberation and defended the integrity of African identity and artistry while living in a land absent of her ancestry. </p>
<p>Despite being banned from her home country for her outspokenness and resistance to apartheid, Makeba went on to build an illustrious international career, performing on some of the world’s most prestigious stages. She would be celebrated – and persecuted – in the US and invited to perform at the independence celebrations of numerous African countries before eventually returning to South Africa later in life.</p>
<p>In commemorating what would have been Makeba’s 90th birthday, it is fitting to pay tribute to her legacy of activism not only as a black African woman often living in exile in a western society but also as an artist who used her craft to teach and conscientise the world about Africa. </p>
<h2>Early years</h2>
<p>Her musical beginnings in the 1940s were at Kilnerton College, a Methodist elementary school where she sang in the school choir. The school’s alumni include South Africa’s former chief justice <a href="https://www.concourt.org.za/index.php/judges/former-judges/11-former-judges/70-deputy-chief-justice-dikgang-moseneke">Dikgang Moseneke</a>, <a href="http://www.unizulu.ac.za/unizulu-celebrating-the-legendary-musical-icon-professor-khabi-mngoma/">Professor Khabi Mngoma</a>, a hugely influential figure in music education, as well as struggle icon <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/lilian-masediba-ngoyi">Lilian Ngoyi</a>. </p>
<p>Makeba’s break into the professional circuit was with the singing group the Cuban Brothers. She later joined the well-established <a href="https://www.thepresidency.gov.za/national-orders/recipient/manhattan-brothers">Manhattan Brothers</a>. They sang vernacular verses over what was a predominantly American swing and ragtime sound. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Trailer for Come Back Africa.</span></figcaption>
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<p>She was a founding member of the famous all-woman singing group <a href="https://www.allaboutjazz.com/miriam-makeba-and-the-skylarks-vol-1-miriam-makeba-and-the-skylarks-vol-2-miriam-makeba-teal-records-review-by-ed-kopp">the Skylarks</a>. In 1952, she was cast in Alf Herbert’s <a href="https://soulsafari.wordpress.com/2009/03/22/african-jazz-variety-alfred-herbert-1952/">African Jazz and Variety</a> production showcasing black talent. It was presented mainly to white audiences except on Thursdays when black audiences were allowed. This is where film producer Lionel Rogosin spotted Makeba and persuaded her to feature in his controversial documentary film, <em><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049087/">Come Back Africa</a></em>. </p>
<p>This film depicted the harsh conditions under which black South Africans were forced to live by the apartheid government. Makeba’s short appearance attracted attention, including an invitation to attend the film’s premiere in Italy. Naturally, she agreed, never imagining that because of her role in the movie she would be banned by the apartheid state from returning home, not even to bury her own mother. This marked the beginning of her exile.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/449501/original/file-20220302-21-1whx1ff.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man and woman hold one another, smiling against a blue backdrop." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/449501/original/file-20220302-21-1whx1ff.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/449501/original/file-20220302-21-1whx1ff.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449501/original/file-20220302-21-1whx1ff.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449501/original/file-20220302-21-1whx1ff.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449501/original/file-20220302-21-1whx1ff.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449501/original/file-20220302-21-1whx1ff.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449501/original/file-20220302-21-1whx1ff.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="attribution"><span class="source">RCA Victor</span></span>
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<p>Promoting the film in London, Makeba met African American folk singer and activist <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Harry-Belafonte">Harry Belafonte</a>. He would play a significant role in her career in the US, forming half of the duet on their <a href="https://www.grammy.com/artists/miriam-makeba/4292">Grammy-winning</a> album <em><a href="https://www.miriammakeba.co.za/releases/An-Evening-With-Belafonte-Makeba-1965">An Evening with Belafonte & Makeba</a></em>.</p>
<h2>Art as activism</h2>
<p>Her artistry extended beyond the stage, beyond her impeccable vocals and her sophisticated interpretations of international and South African repertoire. Her very presence in the United States stood as a form of activism against the apartheid government who had attempted to silence her and erase her from the consciousness of her people. </p>
<p>Makeba’s life in the US coincided with the parallel experiences of black people in America and South Africa suffering immense injustice, marginalisation, racism and inequality. Like the struggle against apartheid in South Africa, the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/American-civil-rights-movement">Civil Rights Movement</a> in the US was a vehicle through which black Americans protested. Academic Barber-Sizemore <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/17533171.2012.715416">describes</a> Makeba’s voice as being “a surface onto which Americans projected their own narratives about Africa and American race relations”. </p>
<p>Her artistry, always informed by the circumstances in South Africa, served as a razor-sharp awareness tool. In journalist Gwen Ansell’s book <a href="https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Soweto-Blues%3A-Jazz%2C-Popular-Music%2C-and-Politics-in-Ansell/55a1e1246a1e98828e11447f7e347f76520cf11f"><em>Soweto Blues</em></a>, the late <a href="https://theconversation.com/remembering-hugh-masekela-the-horn-player-with-a-shrewd-ear-for-music-of-the-day-86414">Hugh Masekela</a> concurs that</p>
<blockquote>
<p>There’s nobody in Africa who made the world more aware of what was happening in South Africa than Miriam Makeba. This was because of the way in which she described the songs…unwittingly she educated African American artists.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Makeba would describe life in apartheid South Africa when introducing her songs and would use every opportunity to address inequality. As analysed by academic Louise Bethlehem, Makeba’s work <a href="https://doi.org/10.1215/01642472-6917766">resisted</a> the apartheid state’s threat to dismantle the very place of African art and culture in the world.</p>
<p>African Americans saw in Makeba not only what they were but also the possibilities of what they could become, expressed through song, dance, dress, language and ideology. Makeba found commonality with artists such as <a href="https://www.ninasimone.com/biography/">Nina Simone</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2010/aug/15/abbey-lincoln-obituary">Abbey Lincoln</a>, who historian Ruth Feldstein <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/how-it-feels-to-be-free-9780195314038?cc=za&lang=en&">referred</a> to as “an emergent collective of black women performers who combined their music with civil rights activism”. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Mama Africa the documentary.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>Aesthetic as activism</h2>
<p>What I appreciate most about Makeba is the way in which she not only embraced but leaned into her sexuality and sensuality. The way she moved her body on stage was often provocative, drawing the audience into her world. She understood acutely the power of her black body and its curvature. </p>
<p>Her aesthetic of natural hair and minimal make up (if any at all) communicated eloquently her strong sense of self, rooted in her African identity free from the expectations of western notions of beauty and acceptability. </p>
<p>In remembering Makeba, we must guard against confining her activism to the anti-apartheid speeches she delivered at the United Nations in <a href="https://www.unmultimedia.org/avlibrary/asset/2553/2553678/">1963</a> and <a href="https://africanactivist.msu.edu/image.php?objectid=210-809-1981">1976</a>. Her activism was far more nuanced than that. It was interwoven in her music, her delivery of melodies, lyrics and artistic sentiment. Her artistry was a lantern that burnt vigorously through one of the darkest eras in history.</p>
<h2>A legacy spanning generations</h2>
<p>Kenyan author Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, <a href="https://lithub.com/mukoma-wa-ngugi-what-decolonizing-the-mind-means-today/">believes</a> that Africans singing in their native language is an international act of decolonisation and a marker of Pan African identity. Academic Aaron Carter-Enyi <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332734100_Decolonizing_the_Mind_Through_Song_From_Makeba_to_the_Afropolitan_present">acknowledged</a> Makeba’s influence on other African singers to sing in their mother tongues. Like Benin’s <a href="http://www.kidjo.com">Angelique Kidjo</a> who sings in Yoruba, Mali’s <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Oumou-Sangare">Oumou Sangare</a> who sings in Mandinka and Nigeria’s <a href="https://npl.ng/team_members/onyeka-onwenu/">Onyeka Onwenu</a> who sings in Igbo. </p>
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<span class="caption">Makeba performing in Johannesburg in 2005.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">LEXANDER JOE/AFP via Getty Images</span></span>
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<p>Makeba’s influence transcends generations to reveal itself in contemporary cultural practices. We are because she was. Makeba’s legacy is too often suffocated by the complexity surrounding her <a href="https://www.news24.com/News24/who-owns-miriam-makeba-20180617">intellectual property</a> as well as her relationships with the men in her life. </p>
<p>Makeba was not just the wife of musician Masekela or <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Black-Panther-Party">Black Panther</a> leader <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Stokely-Carmichael">Stokely Carmichael</a>. She was not Belafonte’s “discovery from South Africa”. She arrived in America a consummate professional fit for purpose.</p>
<p>The role of these male figures in Makeba’s life may have been meaningful but it is also grossly overstated. Makeba’s legacy is strong enough to stand on its own two feet. Her name needs no co-anchor. She fought more with her “artivism” than many a man did with their armed weaponry. </p>
<p>It’s time to move beyond her widely-adopted nickname “Mama Africa”. Makeba was a stalwart and an icon of African liberation and identity. Her legacy carved the way for future generations to live a life of authenticity, fearlessness and bravery.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/178230/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nomfundo Xaluva does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Makeba, who would have turned 90 on 4 March 2022, was a hugely influential artist and an icon of African liberation and identity.Nomfundo Xaluva, Lecturer, South African College of Music, University of Cape TownLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1319392020-02-18T11:22:35Z2020-02-18T11:22:35ZDance softly and carry a big voice: understanding Joseph Shabalala<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315738/original/file-20200217-10985-1x43trs.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Lars Baron/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>When Joseph Bekhizizwe Shabalala <a href="https://theconversation.com/of-strong-winds-heavy-hearts-and-joseph-shabalala-telling-the-south-african-story-131848">passed away</a> I stopped in my tracks and just let the sadness pull me down. And then inspiration from his beacon of a life lifted me back up. </p>
<p>Shabalala’s own response to the devastating murder of his wife <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2002/may/29/guardianobituaries.robindenselow">Nellie</a> in 2002 was the transcendently uplifting album by his ensemble <a href="https://mambazo.com/">Ladysmith Black Mambazo</a> called <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2003/may/02/popandrock.shopping1">Raise Your Spirit Higher</a>. It won a Grammy in 2003. </p>
<p>What is our response to the great artistic and spiritual hole his loss has left in South Africa? The journalistic tributes have poured in from all over, both at home and abroad. This saves me the labour of reviewing the innumerable highlights of Shabalala’s extraordinary shooting star of a life and career. What does remain for us academic tortoises waddling after the journalist hares is to meditate on the quality and character of his unique personhood and achievement, and their meaning for South Africa and indeed the world. </p>
<h2>Directed by dreams</h2>
<p>To begin at the beginning, Shabalala’s parents were not simply tenant farmers in the district of Ladysmith, KwaZulu-Natal, but more significantly <a href="https://www.britannica.com/science/sangoma">Zulu spiritual diviners</a> and herbal doctors. The religious approach of physical and psychological healing as a single unified medical system was inculcated from birth, along with the intense outpouring of singing, drumming, and dancing such treatment requires.</p>
<p>This is important when we consider the role of dreams in Shabalala’s creative autobiography. Dreams are a vital source of inspiration and communication from the netherworld in indigenous southern African religion. </p>
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<span class="caption">Ladysmith Black Mambazo perform at Carnegie Hall in New York.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jack Vartoogian/Getty Images</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>Their power carries over into African Christianity, which Shabalala took up devoutly after the early success of Ladysmith Black Mambazo in the 1970s. “The Church of Christ the Dreamer” as playwright and author <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/harold-athol-fugard">Athol Fugard</a> called it in his novel Tsotsi. </p>
<p>Shabalala’s dream of a choir of children singing “in perfect harmony” proved formative in his ensemble’s career. For the rest of his life he dreamt of new songs, new arrangements, techniques, and disciplines that the group developed and performed on stage. Directed by dreams, he was a formidable, uncompromising taskmaster in rehearsal. </p>
<p>This submission to the spirit of musical harmony in dreams helps to explain the secret of Ladysmith Black Mambazo’s success. Regardless of their highly localised genre, they were just so good, and the global audience was absolutely enchanted. I recall listening to them at New York’s cavernous Carnegie Hall in 1988. For three uninterrupted hours, using only their voices and synchronous choreography, they kept the audience spellbound at the edge of their seats in awed, worshipful silence.</p>
<h2>A bridge with the West</h2>
<p>The Africanisation of Christianity, audible in the group’s <a href="https://ums.org/2010/01/14/what-is-isicathamiya/">isicathamiya</a> genre, produced a blend of Christian hymnody and isiZulu male polyphonic vocal traditions. This deep synthesis provided a bridge between Zulu and Western music that Shabalala crossed and re-crossed repeatedly by a variety of routes. </p>
<p>This explains in part the naturalness of his ability to collaborate with an astonishing range of American vocalists and composers, from Paul Simon to Stevie Wonder to Dolly Parton. Another part of the explanation was Shabalala’s overwhelming humanism and dedication to social as well as musical harmony, that touched everyone he encountered.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Dolly Parton famously collaborated with Ladysmith Black Mambazo.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>Shaped by migration</h2>
<p>A second foundational theme in the life and work of Shabalala was the necessity of labour migration, which he was forced to undertake at a young age following the early death of his father. The hardships of the migrant labour system, which formed the economic foundation of racial capitalism and <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/history-apartheid-south-africa">apartheid</a>, later became a staple of his lyrical composition and landscape of feeling. </p>
<p>The title song of the group’s album <em>Isitimela</em> (Train) thus laments:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Here is the train; it has gone, 0h father it is going to Pietermaritzburg They will weep, they will remain behind, sorrowful over us …
The heavens are trembling.
If you marry a lady, she will remain behind weeping
They will remain behind, sad over us ….</p>
</blockquote>
<p>These hymns of the hardships of migrant labour – like the rock/maskanda of Johnny Clegg and Sipho Mchunu of <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2019-07-19-00-johnny-clegg-in-retrospect-it-all-began-with-juluka/">Juluka</a> who appeared with them on Ladysmith Black Mambazo’s first overseas tour in 1981 – mounted an implicit political challenge to the white minority government. It transgressed the boundaries of apartheid cultural ideology. </p>
<h2>The face of black South Africa</h2>
<p>Just as importantly, Ladysmith Black Mambazo helped to humanise oppressed black South Africans to a mass audience overseas. The success of Paul Simon’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2012/apr/19/paul-simon-graceland-acclaim-outrage"><em>Graceland</em></a> album and tours in the mid-1980s led to a successful international touring and recording career for Ladysmith Black Mambazo in their own right. </p>
<p>American audiences who enjoyed the stunning beauty and exotic perfection of Ladysmith Black Mambazo’s intricate vocal harmonies could hardly believe that these were the same sort of people as the unarmed protesters that brutal South African police were shown beating, shooting and teargassing on the evening news. </p>
<p>Suddenly, as their song <em>Homeless</em> from the Graceland album prayerfully intimated, every black life in South Africa’s struggle was a real, human life, one whose loss ought to be prevented. </p>
<p>Of course, in reply to those English-speaking critics who believed they looked in vain for political consciousness in Ladysmith’s songs, Shabalala rightly pointed out that in isiZulu there are subtleties of reference that do not survive translation. And that during the struggle virtually all popular music was held to have a political valence in black communities because politics had become the implicit ground of social discourse. </p>
<p>Finally, Ladysmith’s appropriations of African-American hymnody and gospel are part of a tradition of ‘<a href="https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674076068">Black Atlantic</a>’ political cross-fertilisation and aspiration. This receives perhaps its most notable expression in <a href="https://youtu.be/288r0Mo1bFw">Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika</a>, the anthem of the African National Congress that has become the first verse of the <a href="https://www.gov.za/about-sa/national-symbols/national-anthem">national anthem</a> of South Africa.</p>
<h2>A musical Mandela</h2>
<p>Finally, we should pause to consider Shabalala as a kind of musical Nelson Mandela, at once a great talent and a great soul, who humanised South Africans, their troubles and their aspirations, for the world. </p>
<p>Yet he was above all a perfectionist, setting a standard by which our performing artists will continue to be judged by the world audience for a very long time. <em>Phumula ngokuthula, lala ngoxolo mfowethu Bekhizizwe</em> (Rest in peace Bhekizizwe). Because of you, the rest of us have work to do.</p>
<p><em>Some passages are adapted from David B. Coplan’s book <a href="https://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/I/bo5867457.html">In Township Tonight!</a></em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/131939/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Coplan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Joseph Shabalala would grow world famous for his music. But it is shaped by the spiritual aspects of his life as much as it is by the hardships of black life - and by his dreams.David Coplan, Professor Emeritus, Social Anthropology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1318482020-02-14T12:18:25Z2020-02-14T12:18:25ZOf strong winds, heavy hearts and Joseph Shabalala telling the South African story<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315480/original/file-20200214-10991-tv14v9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Joseph Shabalala was the affable leader of <a href="https://mambazo.com/">Ladysmith Black Mambazo</a>, a men’s group that sang <a href="https://ums.org/2010/01/14/what-is-isicathamiya/">isicathamiya</a>, a traditional Zulu genre of South African <a href="https://study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-a-capella-music.html">a cappella</a>. </p>
<p>Even with heavy hearts at <a href="https://mg.co.za/friday/2020-02-12-how-joseph-shabalala-mambazo-chopped-the-competition-down/">his passing</a>, a lot of South Africans know they are much richer for his time in the world. For the group he formed, for making music true to himself and his group while enduring the harsh conditions of <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/history-apartheid-south-africa">apartheid</a>, for the hits they made, for the narratives they wove about the lives of South Africans and for surpassing the social and economic limitations set out by apartheid public policy and its systems of oppression. </p>
<p>It doesn’t matter whether they knew him personally or not. With Ladysmith Black Mambazo, he told their story.</p>
<p>The group had a number of hits and was showered with <a href="https://www.grammy.com/grammys/artists/ladysmith-black-mambazo">endless</a> <a href="http://www.thepresidency.gov.za/national-orders/recipient/ladysmith-black-mambazo">accolades</a> for its oeuvre over its 60-year career. </p>
<p>But the impact of one song in particular stands out for me because of its personal layers of meaning as a black South African of a particular generation, as an occasional music performer and music researcher. </p>
<p><em>Homeless</em> was one of the group’s first slew of hits on both South African shores and abroad. It was a song on Paul Simon’s collaborative, politically controversial but successful 1986 <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2012/apr/19/paul-simon-graceland-acclaim-outrage"><em>Graceland</em> album</a>. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/JFQ1TSzdpRA?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Ladysmith Black Mambazo/YouTube.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>On the surface, <em>Homeless</em> <a href="https://www.lyrics.com/lyric/5225632/Ladysmith+Black+Mambazo/Homeless">is a song</a> that laments the strife that comes with a broken home, being homeless and sleeping rough on cliffs while looking onto a lake with the moon shining on it. Fundamentally, however, it is a song about the excesses of apartheid and the flourishing of Ladysmith Black Mambazo.</p>
<h2>Homeless</h2>
<p>I heard <em>Homeless</em> countless times. On the radio in the house where I lived, in taxis and just about anywhere outside on the streets of Northcrest, <a href="https://www.places.co.za/html/mthatha.html">Mthatha</a>, a small town in the eastern part of South Africa. I was a six-year-old, far away from my mother, separated from her by almost 1,000 kilometers, constantly longing for her and the feeling of home she simply was. I only saw her a handful of times a year because she worked in Johannesburg and each time I heard the song I too felt homeless. </p>
<p>This was at the height of <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/people-armed-1984-1990">political unrest</a> in the late 1980s. The government had imposed a <a href="http://www.saha.org.za/ecc25/ecc_under_a_state_of_emergency.htm">state of emergency</a>. But none of that mattered to me. I couldn’t be with my mother.</p>
<p>Even with my weak command of the English language at the time, I understood the idea of homelessness and so the song easily spoke to me. Its Zulu phrases highlighting “<em>inhliziyo yam</em>” (my heart) also spoke to my experience of a heavy heart and separation in potent ways, ways my little mind couldn’t communicate or fully process. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315481/original/file-20200214-11011-6bs2kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315481/original/file-20200214-11011-6bs2kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315481/original/file-20200214-11011-6bs2kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315481/original/file-20200214-11011-6bs2kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315481/original/file-20200214-11011-6bs2kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315481/original/file-20200214-11011-6bs2kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315481/original/file-20200214-11011-6bs2kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315481/original/file-20200214-11011-6bs2kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Joseph Shabalala beams during a Washington performance with Paul Simon in 2007.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Scott Suchman/WireImage</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The song expressed a depth of emotion and meaning about unique political strong winds as the group belts out “strong wind destroy our homes”. The kinds of strong winds that shatter some of what makes us whole and lead us to not realise our potential. The kinds of strong winds that have charted the fragile social and economic path South Africa is on today, a path shaped by <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2019-11-19-why-sa-is-the-worlds-most-unequal-society/">generational exclusion</a> from development, education and wealth.</p>
<h2>About so much more</h2>
<p>Later in my life, in a democratic South Africa, I took courses in ethnomusicology and had the opportunity to analyse and contextualise the music of Ladysmith Black Mambazo. Listening to <em>Homeless</em> again took me right back to that state of childhood longing. </p>
<p>But with more knowledge about the brutal political history during which genres like isicathamiya were birthed, the hostile conditions in which Ladysmith Black Mambazo operated at night and on weekends over years, the dire social and economic conditions of black people, I realised that these were the realities of the majority of South Africans. </p>
<p>I realised that this song did not just tell my story or was about an experience unique to me. It was about our collective history. It was about the history of black South Africa and those from surrounding countries trapped by a migrancy-mining complex which would institutionalise family separation and consciously ignore its bleak aftermath.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315482/original/file-20200214-10976-hiptsu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315482/original/file-20200214-10976-hiptsu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315482/original/file-20200214-10976-hiptsu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315482/original/file-20200214-10976-hiptsu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315482/original/file-20200214-10976-hiptsu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315482/original/file-20200214-10976-hiptsu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=525&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315482/original/file-20200214-10976-hiptsu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=525&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315482/original/file-20200214-10976-hiptsu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=525&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Joseph Shabalala takes a coffee break during rehearsals at the Sydney Hordern Pavilion in 2009.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Philip Wayne Lock/Fairfax Media/Getty Images</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Even though credited to both Joseph Shabalala and Paul Simon, <em>Homeless</em>, like other Ladysmith Black Mambazo songs before and after the <em>Graceland</em> album, involved the harsh reality of migrant labour, the cycle of poverty it created, family separation, politically-sown dysfunction, heavy hearts, broken dreams, cultural heritage, disempowerment, dispossession, seeds of generational and social decay, resignation to this fate, adapting to it to find simple pleasures, and life in contemporary South Africa. </p>
<p>As part of this Ladysmith Black Mambazo tradition of social commentary, <em>Homeless</em> is a tale of so much more. For instance, the song is also about winning over the hearts and minds of people in foreign lands for the sake of validation and legitimacy. </p>
<p>On one level in the song, Ladysmith Black Mambazo seems to boast, with incredulity, about what it has achieved: “<em>Yith’omanqoba, esanqoba lonk’ilizwe… Esanqoba phakathi eNgilan</em>”. This phrase means, “We’re the winners, we won all over the world, we won right inside England.”</p>
<p>Winning hearts in England also makes the case that Ladysmith Black Mambazo “has arrived”. This ‘arrival’ relates to the success of managing to escape apartheid’s government-prescribed limitations around the social and economic conditions for them as black people. Ladysmith Black Mambazo as such exceeded the black man’s relegation to the status of labourer. Performing abroad removed them from industrial labour. Having a performance career in countries like England was at that time in history rare for black people. </p>
<p>In spite of that, from that point on, Ladysmith Black Mambazo existed on an international plane. Through this lens, England validated them as legitimate music performers outside of competing only at isicathamiya competitions.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315484/original/file-20200214-11023-ngm1z7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315484/original/file-20200214-11023-ngm1z7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315484/original/file-20200214-11023-ngm1z7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315484/original/file-20200214-11023-ngm1z7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315484/original/file-20200214-11023-ngm1z7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315484/original/file-20200214-11023-ngm1z7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315484/original/file-20200214-11023-ngm1z7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315484/original/file-20200214-11023-ngm1z7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Joseph Shabalala sang of the pain of a nation – and then took his traditional isicathamiya sounds to the rest of the world.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Joe Klamar/AFP/Getty Images</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Conquerors</h2>
<p>With his widely reported genial nature, Shabalala led his group to conquer hearts and minds in many countries with their performances. They nurtured networks abroad to their own benefit and managed to sustain a career outside South Africa. </p>
<p>Participating in <em>Graceland</em> had a large hand in dealing this opportunity. It introduced Ladysmith Black Mambazo to systems, gatekeepers, powerbrokers and performance circuits they would not have had while performing only in their home country. Shabalala thus managed to pull off what many South African contemporary music artists are struggling with in the absence of a convincing music circuit, sufficient government and corporate sector programmes to promote South African music abroad and penetrate global markets, as well as a culture of consuming South African products to advance the South African story. </p>
<p>He told the South African story at home, and away from home.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/131848/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Through the University of Fort Hare, Akhona Ndzuta receives funding from the NRF. </span></em></p>The passing of music giant Joseph Shabalala rests heavy on South African hearts - he told the story of black migrants within the apartheid system in a way no-one else did - and achieved global fame.Akhona Ndzuta, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of South AfricaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/864142017-10-29T11:12:40Z2017-10-29T11:12:40ZRemembering Hugh Masekela: the horn player with a shrewd ear for music of the day<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192191/original/file-20171027-13340-27cnqe.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Hugh Masekela performing during the 16th Cape Town International Jazz Festival.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Esa Alexander/The Times</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Trumpeter, flugelhorn-player, singer, composer and activist Hugh Ramapolo Masekela <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/tshisa-live/tshisa-live/2018-01-23-breaking-legendary-musician-hugh-masekela-has-died-report/">has passed away</a> after a long battle with prostate cancer.</p>
<p>When he cancelled his appearance last year at the Johannesburg Joy of Jazz Festival, taking time out to deal with <a href="https://www.enca.com/media/video/hugh-masekela-cancels-future-shows-as-he-battles-cancer?playlist=112">his serious health issues</a>, fans were forced to return to his recorded opus for reminders of his unique work. Listening through that half-century of disks, the nature and scope of the trumpeter’s achievement becomes clear.</p>
<p>Masekela had two early horn heroes. </p>
<p>The first was part-mythical: the life of jazz great <a href="http://www.redhotjazz.com/bix.html">Bix Biederbecke</a> filtered through Kirk Douglas’s acting and Harry James’s trumpet, in the 1950 movie <a href="https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/young_man_with_a_horn/">“Young Man With A Horn”</a>. Masekela saw the film as a schoolboy at the Harlem Bioscope in Johannesburg’s Sophiatown. The erstwhile chorister resolved “then and there to become a trumpet player”.</p>
<p>The second horn hero, unsurprisingly, was <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/artist/miles-davis-mn0000423829/biography">Miles Davis</a>. And while Masekela’s accessible, storytelling style and lyrical instrumental tone are very different, he shared one important characteristic with the American: his life and music were marked by constant reinvention. As Davis reportedly said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I don’t want to be yesterday’s guy.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Much has already been written about Masekela’s life and its landmarks: playing in the Huddleston Jazz Band in the 1950s on a horn donated by Louis Armstrong; performing in the musical <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/king-kong-musical-1959-1961">“King Kong”</a> in the 1960s and at the Guildhall and then Manhattan schools of music with singer <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/miriam-makeba">Miriam Makeba</a>; US pop successes in the 1970s and then touring Paul Simon’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2012/apr/19/paul-simon-graceland-acclaim-outrage">“Graceland”</a> in the 80s and 90s. </p>
<p>What is less discussed is the <a href="http://electricjive.blogspot.co.za/search?q=Masekela">music</a>, and the innovative imagination he has periodically applied to draw it fresh from the flames.</p>
<h2>Breaking new ground</h2>
<p>The Huddleston band, plus time as sideman and in stage shows, were the traditional career path for a young musician. But then Masekela broke his first new ground. With fellow originals, including saxophonist <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/kippie-jeremiah-moeketsi">Kippie Moeketsi</a>, pianist <a href="https://abdullahibrahim.co.za/">Abdullah Ibrahim</a> and trombonist <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/jonas-mosa-gwangwa">Jonas Gwangwa</a>, as <a href="http://www.npr.org/2017/04/26/525696698/the-legacy-of-the-jazz-epistles-south-africas-short-lived-but-historic-group">The Jazz Epistles</a> they cut the first LP of modern African jazz in South Africa.</p>
<p><a href="http://tonymcgregor-tonysplace.blogspot.co.za/2008/02/jazz-epistle-verse-1.html">“Jazz Epistle: Verse One”</a> (1960) featured band compositions marked by challenging improvisation – “a cross between mbaqanga and bebop”. <a href="http://www.theartsdesk.com/new-music/south-african-sound-mbaqanga">Mbaqanga</a> is form of South African township jive and <a href="https://www.thoughtco.com/what-is-bebop-2039578">bebop</a> an American jazz style developed in the 1940s.</p>
<p>Masekela had also joined the pit band and worked as a copyist for South Africa’s first black musical, “King Kong”. </p>
<p>This exposure attracted attention to his talent from potential patrons at home and abroad. Pushed by the horrors of the <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/topic/sharpeville-massacre-21-march-1960">Sharpeville massacre</a> when the South African police shot and killed 69 people on 21 March 1960, and pulled by donated air-tickets and scholarships, Masekela left for London, and then New York.</p>
<p>In the next two decades, Masekela’s re-visioning of his music took many forms. He found America hard, but with wife Miriam Makeba (the marriage lasted from 1964 - 1966), the production skills of Gwangwa, and the support of American singer <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/artist/harry-belafonte-mn0000952794/biography">Harry Belafonte</a> he proactively introduced audiences to South African music and the destruction of apartheid. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192192/original/file-20171027-13331-1wspb5h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192192/original/file-20171027-13331-1wspb5h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=767&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192192/original/file-20171027-13331-1wspb5h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=767&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192192/original/file-20171027-13331-1wspb5h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=767&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192192/original/file-20171027-13331-1wspb5h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=964&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192192/original/file-20171027-13331-1wspb5h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=964&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/192192/original/file-20171027-13331-1wspb5h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=964&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A young Hugh Masekela in the 1950s blowing his horn.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Johncom</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>On the ironically titled 1966 live <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/album/americanization-of-ooga-booga-mw0001304086">“Americanisation of Ooga Booga”</a>, he demonstrated the creative possibilities of “township bop”. Masekela did this by mashing up repertoire and playing styles from the South Africa he had left and the America he had landed in. </p>
<p>But he was also looking in other directions: in collaborations with other African musicians; towards fusion (with <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/artist/the-crusaders-mn0000136075/biography">The Crusaders</a>), rock (with <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/artist/the-byrds-mn0000631774/biography">The Byrds</a>) and even pop at the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2011/jun/16/masekela-shankar-play-monterey">Monterey Pop</a>, festival. </p>
<p>That list captures only a fraction of his projects in the 1960s. Some bore instant fruit: his 1968 single, <a href="http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=8369">“Grazin’ In the Grass”</a>, topped the Billboard Hot 100 list and sold four million copies; the previous year’s “Up Up and Away” became an instant standard.</p>
<p>In 1971, he teamed up with Gwangwa and Caiphus Semenya for another pan-African vision: <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/album/hugh-masekela-the-union-of-south-africa-mw0000625550">The Union of South Africa</a>. In 1972 he explored a stronger jazz orientation on <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/album/home-is-where-the-music-is-mw0000789812">“Home is Where The Music Is”</a> with, among others, sax player <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/artist/dudu-pukwana-mn0000210863/biography">Dudu Pukwana</a>, bassist <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/artist/eddie-gomez-mn0000794244">Eddie Gomez</a>, keyboardist <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/artist/larry-willis-mn0000114935/biography">Larry Willis</a> and Semenya.</p>
<h2>Sixties counterculture</h2>
<p>But as the title of “Grazin’ In the Grass” suggests, Masekela was also bewitched by other aspects of Sixties counterculture. He dated his addiction back to the alcohol-focused social climate of his early playing years in South Africa, but by the early Seventies he admitted:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I had destroyed my life with drugs and alcohol and could not get a gig or a band together. No recording company was interested in me…</p>
</blockquote>
<p>That depression inspired the song that achieved genuinely iconic status back home in South Africa: the 1974 reflection on migrant labour, <a href="http://www.mahala.co.za/art/curse-of-the-coal-train/">“Stimela/Coal Train”</a>.</p>
<p>Foreign critics have handed that status to other Masekela songs, such as “Soweto Blues”, “Gold” or the much later “Bring Him Back Home”. Yet powerful though those are, it is Stimela, with its slow-burning steam-piston rhythm that captured the hearts of South Africans in struggle back home, and still does today. And of course the lyrics:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>There’s a train that comes from Namibia and Malawi /there’s a train that comes from Zambia and Zimbabwe/ from Angola and Mozambique…</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Masekela said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>For me songs come like a tidal wave … At this low point, for some reason, the tidal wave that whooshed in on me came all the way from the other side of the Atlantic: from Africa; from home.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Shortly afterwards, Masekela headed off to Ghana, hooked up with <a href="https://soulsafari.wordpress.com/2010/05/03/masekela-introducing-hedzoleh-soundz/">Hedzoleh Soundz</a>, and was soon back in the charts. “Stimela” received its first outing on the album <a href="https://www.musicinafrica.net/magazine/hugh-masekela-i-am-not-afraid">“I Am Not Afraid”</a>, with West African and American co-players including pianist <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/15/arts/music/joe-sample-crusaders-pianist-dies-at-75.html">Joe Sample</a>. </p>
<p>By the mid ‘80s, the hornman was back in southern Africa, recording <a href="http://afrosynth.blogspot.co.za/2009/08/hugh-masekela-techno-bush-1984-jive.html">“Technobush”</a> at the mobile <a href="http://shifty.co.za/the-shifty-story/">Shifty Studio</a> in Botswana, and performing for the Medu Arts Ensemble with a Botswanan/South African band, <a href="http://afrosynth.blogspot.co.za/2009/08/hugh-masekela-with-kalahari-tomorrow.html">Kalahari</a>. His music shifted again: roots mbaqanga came strongly to the fore to speak simply and directly to people now openly battling the apartheid regime just across the border.</p>
<h2>Returning home</h2>
<p>After liberation and his return home, Masekela once more chose fresh directions. In 1997 he banished his addictions and began to showcase the virtuoso player he could have been 30 years earlier without the distractions of the West Coast. He fronted big European jazz bands, and benchmarked a long musical friendship with Larry Willis with the magisterial <a href="http://revive-music.com/2012/05/10/hugh-masekela-larry-willis-friends/">Friends</a>.</p>
<p>But his shrewd ear for the music of today, rather than yesterday, also took him into younger company. He collaborated with current stars – including singer <a href="http://www.thandiswa.com/">Thandiswa Mazwai</a> – often encouraging them to take centre stage. Just before the recurrence of his cancer, he was <a href="http://www.channel24.co.za/The-Juice/News/eye-surgery-forces-hugh-masekela-to-postpone-collab-with-riky-rick-20170915">planning</a> a festival collaboration with rapper Riky Rick. </p>
<p>To cap the transformation, the individualistic rebel of the 60s and 70s became an elder statesman of social activism. In 2001, he established a <a href="http://www.artlink.co.za/news_article.htm?contentID=26912">foundation</a> to help other musicians escape addiction. Once more he foregrounded the music of continental Africa, to campaign against xenophobia. And the return of his own illness became the cue to <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/10/07/hugh-masekela-encourages-men-to-get-checked-for-prostate-cancer">exhort</a> other men to get checked for prostate cancer. </p>
<p>Other South African musicians have succeeded overseas; many have made one mid-career image switch – but few have shown us, in only one person but more than 30 albums, so many of the faces and possibilities of South African jazz.</p>
<p><em>Hugh Masekela, musician, activist. Born: 4 April 1939; Died: 23 January 2018</em></p>
<hr>
<p><strong>Masekela Playlist:</strong></p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Eq0iSZzyWhM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">‘Blues for Hughie’ from the album, Jazz Epistle Verse One.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Kuu_EEbyreA?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">‘Unhlanhla (Lucky Boy)’ from The Americanization of Ooga Booga.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/qxXZF60EPdM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The major Masekela hit, ‘Grazin in the Grass’.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/YTUpZ2-RQdM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Hugh Masekela with ‘Up Up & Away’.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/LYOlXyv-NOU?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">‘Shebeen’ from The Union of South Africa.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/TOJMClzQ294?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">‘The Big Apple’ from Home is Where The Music Is.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/l1fIjdUEe5c?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">‘Stimela’, a South African classic.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/PGZKfIYJvJ8?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">‘Motlalepula’ from Technobush.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/1n1k7NrHUpI?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Hugh Masekela and Larry Willis live.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/vxSm9Z3koZ0?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">‘African Sunset’ with Thandiswa Mazwai.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/9QnXNoVrR8Q?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Masekela in conversation with the rapper Riky Rick.</span></figcaption>
</figure><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/86414/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gwen Ansell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>South African trumpeter Hugh Masekela made an impact across the world during his decades-long musical career.Gwen Ansell, Associate of the Gordon Institute for Business Science, University of PretoriaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.