Musicians told to develop Malawi identity
Patrons at the finale of Lusubilo Band’s national tour asked musicians in the country to fuse into their music cultural elements as a way of developing an identity of Malawian music.
They were reacting to an escalating performance put up by the youthful Karonga-based Lusubilo Band at St John of God Hall in Mzuzu on Sunday.
The concert, with an impressive audience, started with a jazz session by Lusubilo where they played instrumentals and other songs. Led by the band’s vocalist Rebecca Mwalyenje, they did George Michael’s Careless Whisper and James Brown’s I Feel Good.
They left the stage for this year’s Chibuku Road to Fame champions Pamlonga Band, third-placed in the Road to Fame competition Mal-Afri and Tiwonge Hango.
Lusubilo then returned on stage with traditional beats from their new album Africa Inuka. They gave out an energetic performance of songs such as Africa Inuka, Kachitsa, Mama (a dedication to the founder of Lusubilo Music Centre Professor Agnes Chunga Kim), Kalonga and Asimenye yo Kyala.
But it was Kalonga that caught the hearts of most of the patrons who took to the dance-floor with traditional dances as if in solidarity to Lusubilo’s ndingala and mwinoghe dances.
Reacting to the performance, a patron from Chimaliro Residential Area, Augustine Harawa, called on other musicians to follow Lusubilo’s example in fusing culture into their music as a way of developing Malawian music identity.
“If artists can continue to sing in such local languages as Kyangonde and fuse it with other cultural elements as Lusubilo has done then we can promote our culture and expose it to other countries.
“This may help us have an identity in music as is the case with other countries,” he said.
Another patron from Chibavi Township, Wanangwa Kalua, said Lusubilo needs to be given relevant support so that such rare talent is exposed and promoted.
Lusubilo Band was on a national tour that began last week with performances in Balaka, Blantyre, Thyolo and Lilongwe. The show in Mzuzu was the last one. n
