Untitled Document

Manu Dibango

Touring: March, April, May Summer 2004

The global fusion that Manu Dibango created in the 1950s made him an African world-music pioneer. Two projects available: Soul Makossa Gang and the new Ray Lema Bantu Beat project.

Manu Dibango is Cameroon's, and perhaps Africa's, best-known jazz saxophonist. Starting in the 1950s, world attention came to Dibango with the release of Soul Makossa in 1972. Dibango's output has been prodigious and multi-faceted. In addition to being one of the leading jazz saxophonists of his generation, Dibango has also run nightclubs, directed orchestras, and started one of the first African musical journals. A recent release, Polysonik, featuring English rapper MC Mello, Cameroonian singer Charlotte M'Bango leading a choral section, and sampled pygmy flutes, shows that Dibango is continuing to flourish and expand in challenging new directions.

Soul and Makossa. "World Music", a two-word universe, was born in the early 70's. For the first time Africa, in the form of Cameroon Makossa, nosed its way into soul, the heir to jazz and rhythm'n blues.

As is often the case, this particular stage in musical evolution, which today is considered as capital, was at the time nearly missed, the b side of a single which should never have got further than the suburbs of Douala. The grandpappy of Makossa Soul, Manu Dibango, plays a key role in our century. Okay, so his work is uneven. That is because he is not after perfection and success every time. Dibango is at least as much a journalist, an anthropologist or a philosopher as he is a musician. Without him, "World Music" would no doubt have existed all the same, but it would have taken at least fifty years longer!

Emmanuel N'Djoké Dibango was born on December 12, 1933 in Douala, Cameroon. His father was from the Yabassi tribe, his mother Douala. This double heritage is important in a country which lives according to ancestral traditions. At home, young Manu spoke Douala, mostly. His father was a civil servant, and his moral standards were an example for his son. Religion was no doubt the reason, for the Dibangos were protestants. Manu went to the temple in the evening and his mother was in charge of the choir.

School was in the village and then he went to "the white man's school". This is where he learnt French. Once he had passed his primary school leaving certificate, his father sent him to Saint-Calais to boarding school. In Spring 1949, young Manu sailed for Marseilles. The family who was to look after him lived in the Sarthe region in the west of France. In 1950, he went to high school in Chartres, a little further south. He made friends with a few Africans, usually from good families, and was happy there, the atmosphere suiting him better than boarding school.

He started music, first the mandoline and then piano.

During holidays in a camp for Cameroon children living in France, he met Francis Bebey, slightly older than he, a jazz fan. Armstrong and Sidney Bechet were, to him, the emblems of black American jazz. The two lads set up a group in which each played his favourite instrument.

This was the time he discovered the saxophone, too. He started taking lessons.

Music was his hobby but he never thought of earning a living from it. Thus, he took his first Baccalauréat in Reims, where he attended yet another school. The following school year was marked by his weekend job in a local night club, the Monaco. Although he intended to do business school later, he failed his second Baccalauréat in 1956, and his father cut off his allowance.

At the end of 1956, he decided to try Brussels. Through a friend, he was hired at the Tabou, a fashionable club in the Belgian capital. He met a mannequin, Coco, who was later to become his wife. Unfortunately, after a quarrel with the owner of the Tabou, he lost his job. A few weeks later, he was offered a tour of the American bases in Europe, with an orchestra. After playing the Moulin Rouge at Ostend and the Scotch in Antwerp, he signed a two year contract with the Chat Noir, in Charleroi.

In 1960, he was hired by a Brussels night-club, Les Anges Noirs, which was very popular with politicians and intellectuals from Zaïre. At that time the town was buzzing with the independence negotiations and was full of influential people.

In this atmosphere, Manu Dibango, leader of the Anges Noirs group, was playing around with real African music. Until then, he had played mostly music for westerners, cha-cha, tango, assorted varieties etc. The first music to be tried out was from the Congo, and was already well developed. It was his meeting with the great Joseph Kabasélé and African Jazz that was to trigger his music and open the doors of a world he had forgotten. After several years of exile in Europe, Manu Dibango had become a jazz-nourished musician. He rediscovered the sound of the African continent with Kabasélé, who hired him as saxophonist in his orchestra. They recorded some 40 pieces in a Brussels studio together for two weeks. Their records were well-received in Africa, and they were very successful.

With this recording success under his belt, Manu now wished to record solo. "African soul", a mixture of jazz, rumba and Latino rhythm. But even if the result was worth listening to, he did not find a producer.

Soul Makossa

In early 69, he left the singer and signed his first recording contract with Tutti. In autumn he brought out "Saxy Party" with Philips. This album contains remakes and personal compositions. The sound is deliberately jazzy, underlined by the work of an American producer. This recording début only received critical acclaim. Rolande Lecouviour of Decca then contacted him and offered him a second album. He accepted with alacrity and this nameless disc put Manu onto the African, more particularly Cameroon, tracks. It is more for dancing, and evokes aspects of society. His African success delighted Manu, who then began to travel back and forth to Africa.

For the eighth African Nations Cup, the great football event in Yaoundé in 1972, Manu composed a hymn, the other side of which became the biggest African hit of all time, "Soul Makossa".

While at first, neither Yaoundé or Paris seemed to appreciate this piece, a few Americans who were visiting Decca took the single and played it on their radios. It was even ranked in some American charts. But there was such a gulf between America and Europe that only Rolande Lecouviour seemed to believe in Manu's lucky star, and had him record the "O boso" album, which again contained the track (later plagiarised by Michael Jackson). Faced with this American success, Decca contacted Atlantic and arranged a one month tour in the States, with ten days at the famous Appollo in Harlem. This was in 1973. If America had seemed a dream for Manu and his musicians, it was to become reality in the space of a few days. He was already well known and his success was enormous. Black Americans saw in his music the expression of their origins.

The French media at last began to understand that this difficult to place instrumentalist was a talented artist, and he triumphed at the Olympia in Paris at the end of 1973.

He then embarked on a big tour of the US with the Fania All Stars, a large "family" of Latino musicians and singers.

Line up:

Manu Dibango and Soul Makossa Gang

Manu Dibango - saxophone, vocals
Noël Ekwabi – bass, vocals
Conti Bilong – drums
Jerry Malekani – guitar
Julien Agazar – keyboards
Delphine Eteme - vocals

On Stage: 6
Travel Party: 11

Manu Dibango /Ray Lema Bantu Beat Project

Manu Dibango - saxophone, vocals
Ray Lema - piano, guitar, percussions
Jerry Malekani - guitar
Richard Epesse - bass, vocals
Mokhtar Samba - percussions

Cathy Renoir - vocals, percussions

On Stage: 6
Travel Party: 11

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