![]() Stern old Bible thumper, to be sure, but there's a subversively Natives", hitherto forced to wear starched collars and sing horribleĭirges under the direction of dour white missionaries. This American music is a revelation to "civilized McAdoo and his troupe are on the road in Africa, playing to slack-jawed To him that Orpheus might find it interesting to visit. High Commissioner of the Cape ////Colony a few years later, it occurs Triumphant tour of Australia in the 1880s, and when Sir Henry becomes Is leader of the celebrated Virginia Jubilee Singers, a combo that Sir Henry Loch is a rising star of the Colonial Office. Is an African yarn, but it begins with an unlikely friendship betweenĪn aristocratic British imperialist and a world-famous American Negro. His widow couldn't afford a stone for his grave. Melody that earned untold millions for white men but died so poor that This one's for Solomon Linda, then, a Zulu who wrote a More than they got and often ended up with nothing. It was in the nature of this transaction that black men gave Transfusions of ragtime and rap, jazz, blues and soul, all of whoseīlood lines run back to Africa via slave ships and plantations and Twentieth century but danced out the other side vastly invigorated by Of popular music, which limped pale-skinned and anaemic into the Its epic transcultural saga is also, in a way, the story It is the most famous melody ever to emergeįrom Africa, a tune that has penetrated so deep into the humanĬonsciousness over so many generations that one can truly say, here is It has logged nearly three centuries of continuous radio air Hollywood put it in Ace Ventura Petĭetective. New Zealand army band turned it into a march. and Glen Campbell, Brian EnoĪnd Chet Atkins, the Nylons and _ schlockmeister Bert Kaempfert. The theme song of a hugely popular British website. ![]() Wax, which was taken to England and turned into a record that became aĪnd landed in America, where it mutated into a truly immortal popĮpiphany that soared to the top of the charts here and then everywhere,Īgain and again, returning every decade or so under different names and Trembling stylus that cut tiny grooves into a spinning block of bees Haunting skein of fifteen notes that flowed down the wires and into a He just opened his mouth and out it came, a Was standing in front of a microphone in the only recording studio inīlack Africa when it happened. Place in the brain of a man named Solomon Linda. Once upon a time, a long time ago, a small miracle took After six decades, the truth is finally told. Music legends made millions off the work of a Zulu tribesman who died a it is one of the great musical mysteries of all time: How American This all relates to the SA music in crisis article by Angus KerrĪnd his contention that East Coast Radio and the other Top FortyĪmerican Formatted Radio Stations in Africa need to show a little more It'sĪbout time that we get to know a little of our own history & dig Many American & British composers haveĬlaimed the copyright to MBUBE over the past 50 odd hidden years. That's how the American's & Europeans would listen to it if they Song that could have been to SAfrica what 'Waltzing Matilda' is toĪustralia - Goodness forbid!! But you know what we mean. $10 Million dollars (US)!!! Some say $15 Million for a Part 1 of a 3 part series that follows the fate of a great song-writer who 'sold' his soul & song to Gallo Africaįor a few Guinness - when technically & morally he should haveĮarned approx. It's about SAfrican singer-songwriter Soloman Linda - The man who recorded & composed Mbube (aka - The Lion Sleeps Tonight / Whimaway / In the Jungle, etc.). Internationally renowned SAfrican author Rian Malan has researched & written a remarkable expose for Rolling Stone magazine in the USA, on the murky side of music's international mainstream.
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