Sleeve notes for "An African Sampler"

See this video (opens in a separate tab); also this post “Greater than the sum of the parts”.

The guiding principle for the selection of tracks was to pick some personal favourites. I’ve made it unbalanced by choosing three songs from Orchestra Baobab which display Afro-Cuban influence. In defence, I can only say that they are from the years when Baobab were fresh and not their twenty-first century “resurrection” (the word is Wikipedia’s).

It can be very frustrating to hear passionately-sung lyrics and not have a clue as to what they’re about, let alone have a full English (or French) translation. I’ve done my best to put some up on the videos, and give links to the sources for others in the tracklist below. It would have been tedious if the only accompanying images related to the performers, album covers etc., so I’ve made an intuitive choice of other images, usually in ignorance of lyrics, but hopefully in harmony with the emotions portrayed in the music. African song lyrics can often be surprising in translation, when it’s possible to find such any. The Soukous musician Lutumba Simaro has the reputation of a poet, but I had loved his song “Testament Ya Bowule” for a dozen years without having a clue what it is about. I didn’t even know its title, due to a misprint on the CD cover which transposed the titles of two songs. Thanks to the Lingala Institute I found a translation, part of which I’ve used to annotate the video. The Institute have done a YouTube video of another of his songs, Maya, with a synchronized translation in Lingala and English: not very idiomatic, or rather they have not managed to bridge the culture gap. I tinkered with their translation for my own annotations of “Testament”. Another of Lutumba’s songs is “Vaccination”, a theme you’d only expect in Africa, but I can't tell you how it goes, even though like all his songs it includes phrases in French.

There is nothing by Youssou N’Dour here: a big man in Senegal, Africa and the world, and not just for his own music. I have included two of his songs on my compilation “Other Places, Other Times”, which may get a post of its own in due course.

Hyperlinked track list
00:00 Mansa, Super Rail Band, 1996 Mali
06:35 KanKan Blues, Kante Manfila, 1991 Guinea
09:27 Utru Horas, Orchestra Baobab, “Pirates’ Choice”, 1982 Senegal
For an appreciation of the song, see http://www.muzikifan.com/desert.html
16:33 Mouneïssa, Rokia Traore, “Mouneïssa”, 1998, Mali.
For the lyrics in Bambara & French, see this site
22:20 Ndinderere, Stella Chiweshe, “Chisi”, 2001 Zimbabwe
She accompanies herself on the mbira dzavadzimu, “a musical instrument that has been played by the Shona people of Zimbabwe for thousands of years”.
27:21 N’Sangou, Antoine Moundanda & Likembe Géant, “Kesse Kesse”, 1997, Congo.
The likembe is an instrument similar to the mbira played by Stella Chiwese. Antoine’s band employs three extra-large ones.
31:34 On Verra Ça, Orchestra Baobab, “On Verra Ça”, 1978 Senegal (recorded in Paris)
38:47 Coumba, Orchestra Baobab, “Pirates’ Choice”, 1982 Senegal
Sung in French with English translation.
46:30 Kounandi, Rokia Traore, “Tchamantché”, 2007 Mali.
For the lyrics in Bambara, with a summary in French, see this site.
The summary is also shown on the video, in French and English.
51:50 Testament Ya Bowule, Franco Luambo & TPOK Jazz, 30th Anniversary album, 1986, Congo.
The lyric is from a poem by Lutumba Simaro, sung by Malage de Lugendo. Additional verses from the poem are spoken by Franco and overdubbed at the beginning and end. For the full transcription in Lingala, see this site. For a full English translation, see this site.
I’ve synchronized the words in Lingala and English on the video for the first few verses (attempting to make the English more idiomatic in places).
1:03:14 Sanctus, Les Troubadours du Roi Baudouin, “Missa Luba”, Congo 1958.
For the story of this Mass, see this Wikipedia article.
Note on the images: As well as various record labels, there are stills from the English film “If....” which features the “Sanctus”, notably in the famous transport café scene, where the renegade public-schoolboy Mick Travis plays it on a jukebox and engages in a surreal dance with the waitress. There are also old photos showing some disgraceful aspects of colonialism in the Congo Free State, whilst it was the personal possession of King Leopold II of Belgium, the great-grand-uncle of King Baudouin, in honour of whom the musicians were named.
“Missa Luba” was arranged by a missionary, Fr. Haazen. Wikipedia observes that “Belgian rule in the Congo was based on the ‘colonial trinity’ (trinité coloniale) of state, missionary and private company interests.”