Thomas Mapfumo - Biography
The single most globally prominent musician to emerge from Zimbabwe, Thomas Mapfumo began his singing career in the 1960s in what was then known as Rhodesia. He began his career singing covers of American soul and British pop before introducing elements of traditional music sung in his native Shona language in the 1970s. As his popularity surged, his unflagging support for Zimbabwe’s independence and the overthrow of colonial rule inevitably put him on a collision course with authorities. Ultimately his music was banned and he was hauled off to jail for several months in 1979, but the “Lion of Zimbabwe” (as he’s respectfully called) and the independence movement would achieve victory in 1980. Mapfumo shared the stage with Bob Marley & the Wailers (“Natty Dread Inna Zimbabwe”) at the national stadium for the historic independence concert that same year.
Born in 1945, Mapfumo spent the first ten years of his life in the countryside of Rhodesia with his grandparents, where he helped herd cattle and was raised with traditional Shona music and culture. Then he and his mother moved to the poor, densely populated neighborhood of Mbare in the capital of Salisbury (now called Harare). His stepfather’s association with both the Christian church and Shona ancestral spirit traditions influenced the young Mapfumo, as did exposure to popular music from South Africa, Central Africa, Europe and America. The environment couldn’t help but spur his political awakening as the local resistance to an oppressive government and exposure to arbitrary police brutality marked his adolescence.
The teenage Mapfumo was smitten with music, taught himself guitar and began singing in high school with some locals who called themselves The Zutus. Later he became the lead singer of The Cosmic Four Dots and finally achieved success in the mid-sixties with The Springfields, who had some minor hits among their eight singles. Original songs like “You Can’t Say Goodbye,” “Kiss Me” and “Springfields Go Latin” show a teen pop sensibility while their cover version of a tune recorded by Ray Charles, “Lonely Avenue,” points to the cosmopolitan nature of the music scene in Salisbury.
With unrest growing in the city, Mapfumo relocated to a mining town and began his next musical venture, The Hallelujah Chicken Run Band. With that group of musicians, Mapfumo began to inject Shona traditions into an electric format. At Mapfumo’s urging, guitarist Joshua Dube patterned his play on the cleanly plucked mbira (a thumb piano made of metal keys attached to a calabash gourd resonator) used in traditional Shona music. Entertaining miners at night, the musicians had day jobs that included working in a chicken run, hence their name. An excellent collection of the band’s work from 1974-1979, Take One (2006-Alula) was compiled for CD release.
As the struggle against white minority rule intensified in Rhodesia, Mapfumo’s music became known as chimurenga (the Shona word for struggle) and he became the bard of the revolution. The mere existence of a popular artist performing and recording exclusively in the Shona language was itself revolutionary. With the Acid Band and The Blacks Unlimited, Mapfumo sang parables that drew on Shona folklore and addressed the rising resentment of the masses. Some of his tunes, sung in Shona and therefore ignored by most white Rhodesians, were more direct and examples translate as “Mothers, Send Your Children to War” and “Trouble in the Communal Lands.” Authorities began to catch on to the impact of chimurenga music and when Thomas Mapfumo and the Acid Band released “Hokoyo!” (1978 Gramma), their first full-length LP, the government promptly banned the song from state radio, helping to ensure that it would become a huge underground anthem.
Jailed for several months, Mapfumo was released after agreeing to perform at a concert for the ruling party of Rhodesia. He performed Chimurenga, to the chagrin of the white minority, explaining that since he had been detained he was unable to compose new songs. Rhodesia’s history as a pariah nation was coming to an end as the Rhodesian Bush War led the white minority government to agree to a power sharing arrangement with the African rebel leaders in March, 1978. Elections were held in 1979 that led to a new African leadership and the country changed its name to Zimbabwean Rhodesia. Elections in 1980 gave Robert Mugabe’s Zanu party a resounding victory and the country celebrated nationhood anew as Zimbabwe.
That same year, Thomas Mapfumo and The Blacks Unlimited released Gwindingwi Rine Shumba (1980 Gramma) in Zimbabwe, which later became his first record to be distributed outside of Africa - through Rough Trade in the UK. The infectious title track was a hit in the exuberant new African nation. “Hwa Hwa” made for great Shona onomatopoeia. “Rita” was more accessible to English speaking fans. The picture on the original cover of this album, which many fans consider his best, shows the band in front of a thatched hut sitting in the dirt, Mapfumo standing behind them clad in black, his eyes serious and piercing like those of an apparition. Another strong LP, Ndangariro (1983 Earthworks) shows Mapfumo sitting in front of a village hut wearing a Rasta hat, black leather trousers and blue shoes — the urbane musician with the folkloric soul.
Mabasa (1984 Earthworks), Mr. Music: Africa (1985 Earthworks) and Chimurenga for Justice (1986 Rough Trade) followed in quick succession on cassette and LP both in Zimbabwe and the UK. The grooves got deeper as the songs (and Mapfumo’s dreadlocks) got longer. In Zimbabwe-Mozambique (1988 Gramma), released originally only in Zimbabwe, Mapfumo continued to comment on politics in Africa. With a large body of work behind him and greater recognition by the world music community, Chris Blackwell signed Mapfumo to his Mango imprint and released Corruption (1989). Released amidst the background of government scandals in Zimbabwe, Mapfumo employed English on the title cut to sing out against the insidious collapse of morality. Not surprisingly, Mugabe, showing no signs of relinquishing control, was not pleased and Mapfumo would begin to feel increasing pressure to keep quiet on the home front.
With Blackwell’s support behind him, Mapfumo’s music reached an enthusiastic European audience and he began to tour internationally. His 1991 release, Chuamunorwa: What Are We Fighting For? (Mango), maintains the same deceptively slow tempo throughout but is a masterful production that captures the transcendental nature of this modern roots music. While impressing critics and cultivating a world audience, his record sales did not reach superstar status and Mapfumo would have to content himself with releasing a cassette a year with new songs and touring abroad regularly through the ‘90s. He continued to speak out against corruption, alcoholism, domestic violence and about AIDS. Hondo (1993 Gramma/Zimbob) and Vahnu Vatema (1994 Gramma/Zimbob) were released on CD in the US.
Performing up to five nights a week back home, his concerts were legendary, marathon performances that could last until dawn. Although his shows in the US and Europe were condensed to a couple of hours, they were still remarkable. The top-notch musicians would lay down a steady, incessant beat as swirling, treble-toned guitar riffs chimed and washed with rhythmic shakers, punctuated by handclaps. The female chorus harmonized sharply as they moved their feet non-stop, responding to Mapfumo’s mantra-like, mellifluous lead. Tall and skinny, the dreadlocked Mapfumo (like some great bird on the savannah) would bend over, turn his back, close his eyes and perform as if he were a conjurer communing with ancestral spirits. And all the while the band locked perfectly in sync, guitars riffing rapid fire hypnotic patterns to a perfectly timed, mid-tempo beat laid by drums, bass and percussion. Trance-like and ancient yet modern, Mapfumo leads his musicians with hum-along melodies in a feel-good celebration of infectious music.
Chimurenga Varieties, Sweet Chimurenga, Afro Chimurenga, Roots Chimurenga, and Chimurenga Movement were all released by Gramma in Zimbabwe in the ‘90s. Mapfumo did a solid, one-off record for Real World in 1997 called Chimurenga: African Spirit Music. Chimurenga ’98 (1999 Anonym) marked the return of Mapfumo to the US market. Many of his musicians had died of AIDS but he never had a lack of musicians eager to work with him, including Americans. His home away from home in Eugene, Oregon would become his permanent home by the time he released the notable Chimurenga Explosion (2000 Anonym). Recorded both in Harare, Zimbabwe and in Oregon, the song “Disaster” commented on his homeland’s condition and the government’s reaction to losing ground in the 2000 election, sealing his fate. Clearly it was too dangerous for him to return home.
Toi Toi (2002 Anonym) was recorded in both Zimbabwe and the US with different bands. The reggae-leaning results maintain its mbira-rooted integrity.
Choice Chimurenga (2004-Sheer Sound) is a well-compiled collection of material from the ‘90s and the ‘00s, but a better choice is Shumba (1990 Earthworks), which gathers songs from the classic release from which it takes its name as well as other ‘70s and ‘80s gems. Rise Up (2006 Real World) was recorded in Oregon with ten African musicians and three American. With keyboards and trumpet folded into the rhythmic mix, the album has a distinct sound and the song titles reflect the frustration of living in exile. Songs which translate as “Suffer in Silence,” “It’s Payback Time,” “I’m Mad as Hell,” and “What Are They Dying For?” speak directly to his melancholy and anger.
A true musical maverick, Mapfumo cut his chops singing Rolling Stones and Elvis Presley covers in a former British colony trying to shake the yoke of colonialism. From his early years in the pastoral countryside to his formative teens in an urban ghetto, he embraced the deep traditions of his Shona culture. In the ‘70s, he was the principal force behind the modernization of folkloric traditions rooted in the spirit music of his ancestors plucked on the thumb piano. His chimurenga music would provide the soundtrack for the Zimbabwe War of Liberation. Catapulted onto the international stage with Zimbabwe’s independence in the ‘80s, he never lost his musical footing. Though he remains in exile, his music remains with his people to whom he speaks with moral authority about pressing issues in a voice that echoes with the authority of his ancestral spirits.
