THE GOOD YEARS – part 2
I finished off the OP in a bit of a rush, so if you`ll bear with me, I`m going to backtrack to the mid 50s again and pick up a couple of loose ends.
Firstly, because I was zooming in on instrumental jazz, I might`ve given the impression that Miriam Makeba was the only woman in SA capable of singing. To dispel that notion, I`d like to introduce you to
Dolly Rathebe, actress, singer and poster girl (whose song here is dated 1955) and
Dorothy Masuka, who came from Zimbabwe but made her name in SA:-
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I also skipped past an important word in the lexicon of SA jazz;
kwela. This is the local name given to the pennywhistle, a cheap, portable and therefore popular instrument. Originally a Zulu word meaning "get up" (...and dance!),the word was used for a particular style of music too. As it was one of SA`s earliest musical exports, you may`ve heard this kind of music already. Two tracks should be sufficient to illustrate the style; one from the
Basement Boys, dated 1957, and one from
Leslie Nkosi, dated 1958. Although the pennywhistle may not be the best instrument for real kick-ass music, Leslie Nkosi certainly gives it his best shot. (Sharp-eyed experts may notice that his album was produced in Argentina, which makes it a rather strange hybrid.) :-
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So, plenty of good music and talent around in the 1950s, and although all this happened against a background of government restrictions and racial prejudice, by the 60s there were hints that intolerant attitudes were thawing. This brings us back to that King Kong musical, which was first performed in front of an integrated audience on a Jo`burg university campus :-
King Kong (musical) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
And I`ll be in trouble with rostasi if I don`t re-mention Chris McGregor in this context; he did something unthinkable to many by forming an inter-racial band, the
Blue Notes. Here is a 78 rpm recording that they made in 1962, composed by Dudu Pukwana. ( Notice, btw, how in SA the 78 rpm format remained in use years after it had been superseded in the USA and Europe.)
Like many artists, in the early 60s the Blue Notes were playing to appreciative audiences in a series of jazz festivals, the most famous of which were named after the sponsor, Castle Lager. From your seat in the grass at one of those festivals, and from this distance in time, the picture was looking positively rosy.
How and why did it all go wrong?