South African BONGEZIWE MABANDLA playing folk with lyrics in Xhosa
Pop & Hip Hop
•
1h 1m
Bongeziwe Mabandla's South African afro-folk merges elements of traditional Xhosa music, mbakangua, with soul, hip-hop and dub.
Bongeziwe's minimalist titles provoke strong emotions and will delight all lovers of graceful and stripped-down folk.
Just 30, he's fast becoming one of the strong voices shaping the South African scene. A finalist in RFI's Discoveries Awards in 2011, he's now released his second album Mangaliso meaning miracle in Xhosa. Mangaliso "is really about my realisation about the beauty of life, the gift of life and how precious life is. When that happened, when I started to be grateful for life and to see life in a brighter and better way."
That sense of longing for something better drew him to folk music and singers like Tracy Chapman. "That sadness and story-telling, music about people’s needs and people’s struggles and people who feel unjust, that’s what attracted me to folk music."
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