TANZANIAN MUSICIANS WHO DIED IN DECEMBER

Many people believe that the last month of the year tends to be characterized by many shocking tragedies, it seems this is in someway true in the community of Tanzanian musicians. Here are some of the tragedies that befell some Tanzanian musicians in the month of December.
Let me go back to the night of December 12, 2010, on that night Ramadhani Mtoro Ongala, a famous musician also known as Dr. Remmy Ongala died.  Dr Remmy died at the Regency Hospital in Dar es Salaam Dr Remmy came to Tanzanian from Congo and he joined the Orchestra Makassy band, a band led by Mzee Makassy whom Remmy used to identify as his uncle. After some time, Remmy left Orchestra Makassy and joined the Super Matimila Band that was based in Songea, a town south of Tanzania, he again rejoined Orchestra Makassy where at that time I was lucky to be one of the musicians in the band, and on the lineup  of that great band then there was also the great late  Mosese Fan Fan. Dr Remmy again returned to Super Matimila and was the band leader for a long time, playing a style he called the  Bongo Beat. But eventually Dr Remmy left dance music scene and turned to gospel music until death. Dr Remmy was buried on Thursday 16th  December 2010 in the Sinza cemetery, not far from an area named after him, 'Sinza kwa Remmy'.  On the eve of Dr Remmy's burial, various musicians gathered at Dr Remmy's house and played music throughout the night to bid farewell to their comrade. Just two days after Dr. Remmy's funeral, another musician who was riding a motorcycle that led the procession to the cemetery to bury Dr. Remmy had a fatal accident, he was hit by a car and died on the spot, he was returning home with his motorcycle after his music gig, it was Saturday 18 December 2010. The musician was Abou Semuhando also known asG Lokasa or Baba Diana. Abou was a veteran  drummer and was at a time with  Dr Remmy in the Super Matimila Band. Other bands that Abou had  played drums in, include Sola TV Band , Vijana Jazz Band  and The Diamond Sound Group. Abou was buried at his home village in  Kibanda, Muheza.  To add to this sad occasion, on the day of his death, Abou’s eldest daughter was to get married.

Group photo of the Super Matimila Band, standing from left to right - the late Dr Remmy Ongala, the late Abou Semhando, the late Kasaloo Kyanga, the late Mosese Fan Fan. 

Another December death occurred at dawn on 28 December 2011 at the Marie Stoppes Mwenge hospital in Dar es Salaam. The talented bass guitarist Andisye Swebe, better known as Andy Swebe, suffered from an asthma attack at night, he was  rushed  to the hospital, but Andy died. Andy learnt how to play the guitar from David Mussa the leader of Safari Trippers Band, he then played in a small band called Oshekas, but then moved to Morogoro where he was employed in a leather factory. One day Mzee Makassy's band had a gig in Morogoro and when he was invited on stage to play a bit,  Mzee Makassy was so pleased with his playing that he asked him to join the band, that was the beginning of Andy's long journey in music, later he moved to Lovy Longomba's Afriso Ngoma Band, which had at that time great musicians like Kassim Mponda, Raymond Thomas, Seif Lengwe, Sololo wa Imani, John Maida, Ramadhani Kinguti, Kalamazoo and others. Later  he moved to MK Group, after some times left the group and moved to Bicco Stars,  the music journey continued when he and the saxophonist the late Mafumu Bilali launched their own band and called it the African Beats Band. They had  problems about the name of the band, and Andy moved to the Kilimanjaro Connection band under Kanku Kelly and together they toured several countries for several years with this band.  Andy was a freelance musician without a band when death took him, me and him had actually began thinking of coming up with our own band just days before his untimely death.

the late Andy Swebe on the bass guitar

On December 15, 2014, veteran musician Shem Karenga died. Shem Karenga died at Amana Hospital and was buried at Kisutu Cemetery.  Shem had been a member of a number of bands in his life. He started as a bass guitarist playing with the  Lake Tanganyika Jazz of Kigoma, and moved to Tabora Jazz Band where he started playing the lead guitar and composed hits like Dada Asha.  He moved to Dar es Salaam and joined the  MK Beats and finally moved to  Tabora Jazz Stars his last band.

Left Lokassa Ya Mbongo, Shem Karenga

Let me finish the article by remembering the musician whom fans of the Orchestra Maquis du Zaire  band and  Maquis Original Orchestra knew by the his stage name 'Mzee Chekecha'. His official name was Mwema Mudjanga, he was the band's trumpeter but he had a swagger that eventually gave him the name Mzee Chekecha, he was also one of the directors of Orchestra Maquis du Zaire Company (OMACO) and he died on December 6, 2013 in Amana hospital and was buried in Magomeni cemetery Kagera

Mwema Mudjanga - Mzee Chekecha

May they all rest in peace

 

 

ARUSHA DAY TWO

 I woke to a nice sunny day two in Arusha. My schedule included meeting my host Emmanuel in Arusha and also later meet one of the senior managers of Tanzania Film Company (TFC) I had been given his number by another former employee of TFC, and when I contacted him by coincidence he told me he too was in Arusha, I was really excited at the proospect of meeting him, I wanted to ask him a number of things about that company. 

But first I had to deliver a letter to the management of The Arusha Declaration Museum to officially give my intention of working with the museum in researching and providing music composed and recorded about the  Arusha Declaration. It was my intention to then meet my host but unfortunately, he suddenly was nowhere to be seen or heard, and neither did I see the former TFC official, it was disappointing but not the end of the world, life had to go on.
I began walking around Arusha touring all the old music spots that I could remember. I passed by the Metropole Cinema Hall, the AICC where bands like the Ambassadors used to perform, Arusha Hotel, Hotel Seventy Seven and other famous music places of the days gone by and by chance I also passed near a former music shop owned by the late Congolese musician Baba Gaston, and that gave me the idea of looking for old music shops.
Not very far from the Arusha Declaration Museum , there was a shop that sold only gospel music, here first I was really interested in getting a copy of one of my old favorite gospel song,  Kila Mtu atauchukua mzigo wake mwenyewe . and the guy running the shop said he had the song, it was great getting the original audio copy, I have been playing it over and over again since. Most of the shop was filed with CDs and DVDs, but there were also many dusty VHS cassettes of old gospel choirs. When I asked for the price of the VHS cassettes, instead of answering me, the young man  asked if I had a farm, that was so strange, I asked what has me having a farm got to do with the price of the video cassettes? He then gave me a shocker, he said farmers buy those video cassettes and unroll the tapes and spread them around the farms, when the wind blew the tapes would make a noise that scared away birds. That had me laughing out, I had never imagined video tapes being used by farmers for scaring away birds.

I told him I was interested in the songs in the VHS cassettes, he had a lot of the cassettes but unfortunately I couldn't buy all the cassettes I wanted for the lack of enough fund. 

Later that afternoon I thought I would check on a music shop that used to exist in the 80s just near the Arusha Clock Tower, and to my surprise it was still there, the shop was being run by a very jolly  Indian guy, who knew a lot about the music business in Tanzania. He was also now selling Masai  cultural artifacts.
On the top shelves there were some dusty VHS that were staked high on the top of each other. When I told him I was looking for old Tanzanian music video cassettes , he told to see him the next day he would have checked his store where there were more cassettes. The next day I was at the shop and it was a bit disappointing, most of the VHS that he had were of Congolese music but I did get some very interesting video cassettes. I left the shop with my big bag full of VHS cassettes and went back to my hotel room to prepare for the journey back to Dar es Salaam, it was clear there wasn't much I was going to gain for staying in Arusha presently in Arusha