Flatinternational Vol. 3

We will not forget 2020. A global pandemic, protests for racial justice, serious challenges to democracies, digital misinformation, and the ugly resurgence of fascism. This year is marked by a wave of global trauma and sorrow. Families all across the world have lost loved ones, friends, jobs, security, community, and faith. I too was not immune, going through my own family tragedy with the passing of my father in the early stages of the lockdown in South Africa. The difficulty of not being able to travel. No funeral. No goodbyes. Consoling loved ones at a distance over Zoom. For many people these times have brought stagnation, unemployment, depression.

But this moment has also encouraged people to come together in new ways, some have welcomed the break from everyday life and have used the time to develop new practices, change habits, withdraw from excessive consumption, and find novel strategies of being creative in the world.

In March with looming lockdowns and recommended isolation I was fortunate enough to be able to retreat into social isolation with my partner. I felt this could be a fertile time to return to this blog and the South African Audio Archive project, which I had left dormant since my last posts at Electric Jive. Over the last two years I had come across some unusual and interesting recordings and wanted to include those in the Flatinternational database. Also during this period I had been contacted by a number of friends and colleagues with inquiries about various historic South African artists and recordings. Taking on the role of a quasi-librarian, I obliged and generated quite a bit of research. I realized that this too could be a wonderfully serendipitous way to add knowledge to the archive.

For the past few months I have been adding various South African compilations, I originally posted at Electric Jive, to Mixcloud, making them available for streaming. Likewise, I have been reposting the original text for these here at Flatint as a way to reintroduce the various themes. There are still a few more compilations to migrate and I hope to have that all done by early next year.

While doing all this, it seemed fitting to return to the idea of the eclectic mix-tape, using a variety of materials sourced from the archive—new, old and unusual. A process begun so many years ago when Matt Temple at Matsuli asked me to contribute a mix of South African material to his blog in 2008. Since then I have put together over 30 compilations of themed material for Electric Jive and other contexts, but each of those covered a specific subject: Majuba Jazz, Exile Jazz, Kwela, Maskanda and so on.

I wanted to return to a more fluid, serendipitous mix, one that may reflect this challenging moment, but one that also allows me to revisit the days of exploring dynamic music and sharing it with friends. And so for the first time in twelve years I am introducing Volume 3 of the Flatinternational Mix. I do hope that more will follow in the near future.

While there is no specific theme for this compilation, I do feel it captures this moment—the lamentation, the loss, but also the joy and ecstasy of possible futures.

The mix opens with Reuben Caluza’s homage to those that died during the 1918 influenza pandemic that hit South Africa significantly hard. It then travels through some beautiful new and old material, serious and humorous, traditional and experimental, through lamentation, fear, anger, loss, love, hope, ecstasy, and acceptance.




FLATINTERNATIONAL MIX - Volume 3 (FX 11)

01) CALUZA'S DOUBLE QUARTET
Influenza, 1918
from Caluza’s Double Quartet: 1930
Heritage (HTCD 19)
His Master’s Voice (GU 2)
September 1930

102 years ago, near the end of World War 1, two ships bringing troops back home from Europe, docked in Free Town, Sierra Leone where an outbreak of influenza was rampant. Within a few days, there were cases aboard the ship as it continued onto Cape Town, South Africa. The arriving soldiers were at first quarantined, but after being examined over a 72 hour period were allowed to leave for destinations all over the country. Soon, many people adjacent to those on that journey, began falling ill.

The influenza pandemic of 1918 devastated South Africa, making it one of the five hardest hit countries in the world. Approximately 300,000 people died in the first six weeks, roughly about 6% of the population at that time. This disease would go on to kill 50 million people world wide. (Howard Phillips, The Conversation)

Reuben T. Caluza’s “Influenza, 1918” documents the devastation of that historic pandemic on South Africa’s Black community who were particularly hard hit. Recorded in London on September 29, 1930, the song became Caluza’s second disc issued on the Zonophone label (ZON 4277) in October 1930, exactly twelve years after the arrival of the disease in South Africa. It was then reissued on the HMV label (GU 2) eighteen months later in March 1932, again as their second issue. Caluza’s lamentation must have resonated as the tune was also recorded a month earlier than his by the Humming Bees Quartet for Columbia’s Regal label (GR 43) in August 1930.

UK-based Gramophone Company, through a local agent in South Africa, Mackay Brothers, signed a contract with Caluza, and invited him with a nine person choir to make a series of recordings at their studios in Hayes, London. The 150 odd tracks recorded between September 4th and October 8th, 1930 became a landmark series and set Caluza up to become, by some accounts, one of South Africa’s first “recording stars.” Educated at John Dube’s Ohlange Institute where he became a coral conductor and teacher, Caluza in 1934 graduated from Hampton Institute in Virginia, then Columbia University, before returning to South Africa to head the newly formed School of Music at Adams College outside Durban.

Caluaza’s Double Quartet comprised of Irene Msane, A. Ndimande, Sinaye Kuzwayo, Thembani Ngobo, Evelyn Caluza, Nimrod Makanya, Alexander E. Hlubi, Gule, Meinod Dlamini with Reuben Caluza on piano. (Veit Erlmann, African Stars)

02) SHABAKA AND THE ANCESTORS
You’ve Been Called
from We Are Sent Here by History
Impulse! (B0031753-01)
March 2020






We are sent here by history
The lighter gave fire, and was present at the burning
The burning of the republic
Burnt the names
Burnt the records
Burnt the archive
Burnt the bills
Burnt the mortgage
Burnt the student loans
Burnt the life insurance
An act of destruction became creation.

So opens “You’ve Been Called” with lyrics and vocals by South African performance artist Siyabonga Mthembu. Released in March 2020 during the early stages of the Coronavirus epidemic and just preceding the historic world wide protests sparked by the death of George Floyd, the album could be said to foreshadow the dramatic events of this year. But its apocalyptic vision also reflects a mood already prevalent in South Africa following widespread protests throughout the country over the last few years. Uprisings with movements like the Rhodes Must Fall and Fees Must Fall campaigns, and protests against systemic racial inequality, all parallel the album’s urgent temper.

Matthew Ismael Ruiz in his Pitchfork review of the album describes it further: As the world reels from the repercussions of the novel coronavirus, We Are Sent Here by History might feel particularly timely, particularly for those in the West typically shielded from the brunt of capitalism and the brutality of colonialism. But the album, recorded in Johannesburg and Cape Town in 2019, is not so much prescient as it is broadly in tune with the plight of the marginalized. As Hutchings has said, “For those lives lost and cultures dismantled by centuries of western expansionism, capitalist thought and white supremist structural hegemony the end days have long been heralded as present with this world experienced as an embodiment of a living purgatory." (Ruiz, Pitchfork)

London-based, British-Barbadian artist, Shabaka Hutchings teams up with the Johannesburg-based Ancestors for their second album together, We Are Sent Here by History. Some of the group, Tumi Mogorosi, Gontse Makhene and Ariel Zamonsky are also members of the Amandla Freedom Ensemble; while Siyabonga Mthembu fronts the band The Brothers Move On. I was fortunate to experience a live performance by The Brother Moves On at The Chairman in Durban last December and I’m looking forward to their forthcoming vinyl album to be issued by Matsuli some time next year. My thanks to Chris Albertyn for taking me there.

Shabaka and the Ancestors includes Shabaka Hutchings on tenor sax and clarinet, Mthunzi Mvubu on alto sax, Siyabonga Mthembu on vocals, Gontse Makhene on percussion, Ariel Zamonsky on double bass, Tumi Mogorosi on drums, Nduduzo Makhathini on Fender Rhodes, and Thandi Ntuli on piano.

Reviews of We Are Sent Here by History can be viewed at the New York Times and Pitchfork. The album is available at shabakahutchings.com.

03) BARORISI BA MORENA
Ngaphanzi Kwe Ngazi
from Tlong Ba Kresta
RPM (RPM 7053)
1981

Let me first say that this is one of my all time favorite records! Barorisi Ba Morena is a Soweto based gospel group, and one of the earliest pioneers of the South African genre known as "Clap and Tap.” Notably, no instruments are employed here save for voice, clapping and foot tapping.

Formed in 1965, the group was lead by the late Bishop Jacob Kobi Tlou and recorded their first album in 1977: Dipheko - Live In Church (RPM 7029). With over 25,000 sales, that record went gold making them the first South African gospel group to receive such an honour. Since then the group has produced over 30 platinum selling discs. Tlong Ba Kresta is their fourth album. According to their Facebook page every performer in the choir is required to be a member of St. Jacobs Saviours Church in Soweto.

Barorisi Ba Morena roughly translates in Sesotho as the king's praisers or more specifically as ‘Praise the Lord.’ Some incredible live performances by the group can be viewed on YouTube and here. Most of their albums, including Tlong Ba Kresta, are available at iTunes.

04) THE MOVERS
Masterpiece
from Mr Moonlight meets Miss Starlight
City Special (CYL 1024)
1974

“Masterpiece” is a cover of Norman Whitfield’s classic 1973 hit with the Temptations. The Movers’ interpretation comes from their 1974 album Mr Moonlight meets Miss Starlight, probably their twelfth album in five years. This particular album features three tracks (including the title) composed by Lawrence Goreoang, the guitarist for Ikageng's Teenage Lovers and later The Question Marks. The inclusion of Goreoang's tracks lead me to speculate that he may be performing on the album.

Interestingly the track “Thiba Ka Maho” composed on this album by Sankie Chounyane is more or less identical to the classic hit “Thiba Kamoo” by The Beaters which would be issued on their Harari album in 1975. The Movers version predates The Beaters by roughly a year which makes me curious about who the original composer may have been. The Beaters version is penned by Selby Ntuli, Sipho Mabuse and Alec Khaoli.

The liner notes of the Dutch single She Loves You claim that The Movers were formed in June 1969 by keyboardist Sankie Chounyane and producer David Thekwane. Though Rob Allingham maintains that they were discovered and first recorded by producer Hamilton Nzimande. Furthermore the liner notes of their second LP, Greatest Hits Volume 2 actually state that Kenneth Siphayi formed the group in Alexandra. Siphayi's image is featured predominantly on the back cover of their third LP, Greatest Hits Volume 3.

According to Max Mojapelo, the group included Sankie Chounyane, Oupa Hlongwane, Norman Hlongwane and Sam Thabo, though the lineup would shift throughout the seventies. Others that performed with the group included Dinah Mbata, Blondie Makhene, Philip Malela, Jabu Khanyile, Vusi Shange, Rammie McKenzie, Jabu Sibumbe and Lloyd Lelosa.

05) THE BAD REVIEWS
Chakalaka
from Eina!
Bad Paper (BPM 03)
2018

Artist Zander Blom and writer Sean O’Toole pair up on this synth-laden, experimental project peppered with absurdist and sometimes acerbic reflections on South Africa and it’s art world. Their collaboration developed from a series of free-form improvisations at Blom’s Cape Town studio in 2018. The album is abrasive but totally engaging and I find myself constantly trying to decipher the context of each track. “Chakalaka” according to O’Toole, is based on a real incident he experienced in a bathroom at a Shell Station in Potchestroom where he overheard a man ordering meat and food supplies while on the toilet.

Twee tjops, een kilogram rump en ribbetjes, boerewors… en chakalaka!

I acquired this copy from What If The World art gallery around December 2018 and it turned out to be an advance copy. The limited edition vinyl only became available later in 2019 as I was to discover after talking to O'Toole. Bad Paper, the publishers, had set up a display in the gallery with various editioned products, and the gallery staff must have been instructed to wrap each purchased item in white paper and red tape bearing the label's name. I mention this only because the other Bad Paper vinyl album I acquired by NRNA from A4 gallery did not come with a similar outer wrapping.

Eina! is available in a limited edition of 300 copies designed by Ben Johnson, and includes a signed poster within the 16 page booklet insert, from Bad Paper. Videos plus a review of the album by Francois Lion-Cachet, can be viewed at Klyntji.

06) AS IS
Untitled (Track 8)
CD-R in generic paper sleeve
2018

I thank John Peffer for sending me a copy of this unassuming CD-R with recordings by experimental jazz group As Is. The group here includes Andrea Dicó on percussion, Lliezel Ellick on cello and vocals, Garth Erasmus on blik’nsnaar and saxophones, Niklas Zimmer on percussion and Manfred Zylla on accordion, trombone and vocals. Formed in 2010, the group is made up of a number of collaborators and in July 2016 I was fortunate to see a slightly different configuration of the band perform above the Blah Blah Bar in Cape Town.

The venue formed part of Erdmann Contemporary on Kloof Street where some of the performers involved also exhibited. That night I recall the various performers being stationed at different locations in the space, moving and interacting from one room to another. We all, performers and audience, eventually gravitated to a central room taking on our traditional roles of viewers and viewed. At some point someone in the audience, seemingly possessed by the music, began making noises and slid onto the floor. He then slowly crawled through the audience and onto the stage where he located a microphone and began reciting stream-of-consciousness headlines sourced from that days’ news. Something about Hillary’s emails!

The vocalist turned out to be film maker, Aryan Kaganof (or ‘Kalashnikov’ as some people I heard refer to him). Recently Kaganof has been the editor of Herri, an online magazine focussing on music and cultural criticism funded by the Africa Open Institute. As Is over the years has collaborated with a number of artists including Kaganof, violist Brendon Bussy and others. In the mid 1990s Bussy was involved with many of the audio adventures at the FLAT Gallery in Durban.

For some months prior to the evening, I had been in communication with drummer, Niklas Zimmer and we were finally able to meet at the performance. Zimmer, who by day is the head of the Digital Library services at UCT, kindly invited me to visit their archives the following day. He had also worked as an archivist at the Centre for Popular Memory at UCT where he was an audio specialist and digitisation manager. At the archives we viewed various projects he was involved with including some cylinders that had been recorded by Percival Kirby in the 1930s.

Sadly, Garth Erasmus was not performing that night at Blah Blah. I first met Erasmus when we shared a two-person art exhibition, ReSoundings, at the University of Delaware in 2015. His projects included a series of drawings and prints exploring Khoisan history and a display of traditional Khoisan musical instruments. For many years Erasmus has been significantly involved in documenting the cultural heritage of South Africa’s indigenous peoples. For the duration of the exhibition, he installed an eighteen minute looped soundscape named for the Goringhaikona chief, Autshumato, who was imprisoned by the Dutch on Robbin Island in 1659.

Recently, Erasmus has been working on a number of new experimental projects. This past month saw him completing a residency at the Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study (STIAS) where he collaborated with classical flutist, Marietjie Pauw, and a number of other musicians. Together they made over 80 recordings fusing classical with improvisation. Erasmus has also been recording with Jacques van Zyl, on electronics and Charles Palm, on synthesizer, in a yet unnamed trio. In this configuration, Erasmus performs with the Ghorrah bow, live electronics and alto sax "preparations." A term he uses to describe experimentations he has been undertaking for a number of years by interfacing modern technology with the analog of traditional instruments rooted in KhoiSan indigenous knowledge systems. He is now expanding these "preparations" to include other more conventional intruments like the sax. (Erasmus)

Listen to Erasmus perform on the blik'nsnaar at YouTube. View Zimmer's recent sound essay in the current issue of Herri.

07) ASHER GAMEDZE
Hope in Azania
from Dialectic Soul
OntheCorner (OtCR LP 009)
July 2020

Along with Thembinkosi Mavimbela on bass, Buddy Wells on tenor sax, Robin Fassie-Kock on trumpet and Nono Nokoane on vocals, Cape Town-based drummer, Asher Gamedze has produced Dialectic Soul, a stunning debut album released in July 2020, from which “Hope in Azania” is sourced.

This Song, known as ‘Cape to Cairo’ or ‘Azania’, comes from the Pan-Africanist and Black Consciousness traditions of liberation politics in South Africa. It speaks to the urgent desire and project to liberate the continent from ‘Cape to Cairo’, Morocco to Madagascar.’ ‘Azania’ refers to an imagined liberated South Africa. It resonates with a hope that has galvanised generations of revolutionaries from within this country, and links us to the rest of the continent and the diaspora through Pan-Africanism. (Gamedze, liner notes from the LP)

When I first heard this track I immediately thought of it as a classic. Gamedze’s notes refer to the revolutionary future to which the song aspires, and yet the arrangements, for me, operate also as a homage to the rich majuba jazz past.

For the last few weeks I have been trying to place other, older tracks with which it seems to have an affinity — Zacks Nkosi’s “Hoshhhh-Hoha” perhaps, Elijah Nkwanyane’s “Elijah’s Special” or even Mongezi Feza’s “You think you know me…” But none of those quite fit. If anything, I hear elements of those tunes in Abdullah Ibrahim’s “Mannenburg” and maybe I hear distant echoes of "Mannenburg" in "Azania".

Dialectic Soul is available at Bandcamp. Read reviews of the album by Gwen Ansell at the Mail and Guardian; and Hubert Adjei-Kontoh at Pitchfork.

08) ANNA NKOSI AND FRIENDS
Varitone Jump
from Varitone Jump
JAS Pride (BL 108)
1977

Another great album produced by Ray Nkwe on his JAS Pride label (Jazz Appreciation Society). Three tracks, "Shoe Shine Kid", "Varitone Jump" (both composed by Nkwe) and "Yintoni" (by Anna Nkosi) are simply sublime.

I acquired this copy from a second hand record store in Brooklyn, NY. Curiously, the cover is signed by Nkosi and includes a hand-written note to singer and anti-apartheid activist, Harry Belafonte, from Susan (Magidson) Goldenberg.

From the cover inscription and note it appears that Anna Nkosi gave Susan Goldenberg two copies of this record before Goldenberg left South Africa for Canada. My speculation is that Goldenberg left SA for political reasons and sent one copy to Belafonte from Canada, perhaps in hopes that he would be able to help the group in some way. In the note Goldenberg mentions that the group was led by Aaron Lerole (of Black Mambazo fame) and Nkosi, and that she also was a member of the group, though its not clear in what capacity Goldenberg performed.

It is likely that this record came from Harry Belafonte's personal collection though that is just speculation. The record also includes an additional card with an image of a drawing by a Soviet artist with all proceeds going to support the work of the Soviet Jewry Committee at the Holy Blossom Temple. View the card and note at Flatinternational.

09 THE SOUL THROBS
Throbs Away
from The Soul Throbs
Soul Soul (SSL 0101)
1974

The Soul Throbs were principally an organ-driven instrumental, soul group that had some considerable success during the bump jive era of the mid 1970s. This copy is a Mozambican pressing of their 1974 debut album on Teal's Soul Soul label. The album includes contributions by vocalist Sophie Thapedi and saxophonist Abraham Levuno. Its possible that the group was likely lead by drummer Vusi Khumalo, though that is speculation on my part. Khumalo later led the groups Varikweru, Exit and Thetha. Most of the tunes are penned by Vusi Khumalo and G. Khumalo, with the exception of those by Thapedi and Levuno.

I can find little information on the band other than the track “Little Girl” from their second album is included on Duncan Brooker and Francis Gooding’s classic STRUT compilation: Next Stop Soweto Volume 2.

10) LWANDA GOGWANA Maqundeni
New Horizons - Young Stars of South African Jazz
Afrosynth (AFS 049)
September 2020

My only lament with this track is that it is so short. I wish I could listen to it for ten minutes or more. Nevertheless, I’m grateful for it! The tune can be found on the recent vinyl compilation New Horizons put out by Afro-Synth. Run by Dave Durbach (aka DJ Okapi) this label has generally focussed on classic synth-pop from the 1980s, but on this double disc collection, compiled by Shane Cooper and Durbach, they have focussed on new jazz coming from South Africa.

Lwanda Gogwana’s “Maqudeni” was originally released on his 2016 album Uhadi Synth and features Gogwana on trumpet, Kyle Shepherd on piano and synthesisers, Sisonke Xonti on sax, Ameshi Ikechi on bass and Lungile Kunene on drums.

Read Gwen Ansell’s review of Uhadi Synth at her blog Sisgwenjazz and an interview between Gogwana and Seton Hawkins at All About Jazz. Uhadi Synth is available from Amazon and New Horizons can be found at Bandcamp.

11) MASIKE 'FUNKY' MOHAPI
Humnana
from The Slums
Raintree Records (RAH 3004)
1982

Guitarist Masike 'Funky' Mohapi was a member of the classic 1970s group Harari, before moving onto a successful solo career in the 1980s. The Slums, I believe, is his second solo project after Gomora, both being issued in 1982. "Humnana," stands apart from Masike’s other funk/rock tracks in having a somewhat somber, 'easy-listening' quality, but after the entry of horns it builds to an ecstatic almost religious apex. The album is excellent, but this track is sublime! Sadly Mohapi passed away in August 2014 after sustaining injuries from a hit-and-run accident in Soweto.

12) JOHNNY DYANI
Let the Music Take You
from African Bass - Solo Concert - Willisau Jazz Festival
Sing A Song Fighter (SASF 019)
2017

I recently came across this beautifully designed, double pressing of a previously unreleased, live, solo concert by Blue Notes alumnus and South African exile, Johnny Dyani. Recorded on September 2, 1978 at the Jazz Festival Willisau, Switzerland by concert organiser Niklaus Troxler; the performance conveys Dyani’s warmth and a wonderful intimacy. Dyani employs both piano and his iconic contrabass with a humorous give-and-take with his audience. The gatefold publication also includes detailed liner notes by Francis Gooding, who has contributed contextual histories to many recent discs in Matsuli’s important South African reissue series.

The year prior to this concert, Dyani performed at FESTAC ’77, the massive arts and cultural festival held in Lagos, Nigeria. An account of his time there plus his work with the ANC in exile is given in the recent Chimurenga publication FESTAC ’77 and is well worth the read. A few vinyl copies of African Bass (eleven as of this posting) are still available at Bandcamp.

13) THOKOZANI MHLAMBI
Lizalise
from Zulu Song Cycle
Mountain Records
2019

Perhaps it is fitting to end the compilation with this lamenting and yet uplifting song. “Lizalis' idinga lakho” (Fufill thy promise) is an iconic hymn composed by evangelist, translator, teacher and pioneering intellectual, Tiyo Soga, the first Black South African to be ordained in 1856 in the United Presbyterian Church. Composed in 1857, the song became hugely popular and, notably, was sang at the opening of the SAANC’s inaugural conference in Bloemfontein in January 1912.

Dr. Thokozani Mhlambi performs the song with grace. I first met Mhlambi in Durban last year where he kindly gave me a copy of his new CD, Zulu Song Cycle. Mhlambi takes an experimental approach to Western classical music intersecting it with Zulu and Xhosa traditions. The album is impeccably recorded, with multi-tracking employed on a number of songs where he performs layers of instrumentation and vocals. His principle vehicle is the cello, but integrated throughout the album are traditional instruments such as the string bow, uhadi and seaweed horn. From an interview in the CD’s liner notes he describes the album in this way:

I think the album is a representation of my journey, throughout the album there are interludes where I play the Bach cello suites, which are so famous in the world of Western classical music. But between these interludes are my own compositions, which are deeply invested in Africa, even as I use the cello, and sometimes the Nguni music bows. The struggle between these worlds, which on the surface seem irreconcilable, is what I have tried to bring forth in the album. (Mhlambi, from the CD liner notes)

In 2019 Mhlambi embarked on the Early African Intellectuals as Composers of Music project to document and create awareness around historical composers from South Africa like Soga, Enoch Sontonga, John Langalibalele Dube, Nokutela Dube, Reuben Caluza and others.

[This] Project is an initiative that will honour, celebrate and revive the musical craft and intellectual property of Africans from yesteryear. It is a historical undertaking that seeks to ‘wake up’ the African to his/her ancient music composition and intellectual excellence; as well as raise awareness of and educate about the birth and journey that has been traveled by compositions of the past while finding a place for them to be recognized and enjoyed in the current African renaissance.
   Africans and South Africans in particular will learn about, celebrate and enjoy the revived sounds of Ntsikana, Enoch Sontoga, Tiyo Soga to name a few. Some legendary craft has come from such composers/intellectuals and the Early African Intellectuals as Composers of Music project will revive and position them in a manner that educate and inspire audiences. This legacy project will inspire future generations and aspirant composers. It is poised to disrupt the arts industry. It is an ‘arts intellectual revolution.’ (African Intellectuals as Composers of Music, Facebook)

Recently Mhlambi published a critical examination of Hugh Tracey and his colonial approaches to the archive in the recent edition of Herri. Zulu Song Cycle is available at Amazon.

The Imaging of Zulu

THE IMAGING OF ZULU
By Siemon Allen

Recently I was invited to participate in a round table on the theme of "Global Zulu" for the 16th triennial ACASA conference hosted by the Brooklyn Museum in New York City. Organized by Gary van Wyk and Lisa Brittan, the presentation was a precursor to their curatorial work around an exhibition based on the same theme. Other participants on the round table included Hlonipa Mokoena (Columbia University), Sandra Klopper (University of Cape Town),  Dingani Mthethwa (Virginia Commonwealth University) and Catherine Elliot (University of East Anglia / British Museum). Gary had invited me to talk about the use of Zulu iconography on record covers but I chose to take a slightly broader approach by including earlier material. My text and images presented at the conference follow below:

I came to this round table not as a specialist on Zulu Culture but rather as an artist who for the last 15 years has been working on a series of projects based around the theme of Imaging South Africa.  For these projects I collect, archive and display various artifacts, specifically those that have left the country and exist in the wider world, and ones that, for better or worse, construct images of South Africa. The vast majority of these artifacts are paper ephemera such as stamps, trading cards, postcards, record covers, and so on. Today I will focus on one aspect of that constructed South African image — Zulu culture — and how it has been imaged in the West.

The first written accounts of Zulu cultural life seen through Western eyes were made by explorers Nathaniel Isaacs and Allen Francis Gardiner in two separate books both published in England in 1836 and illustrated with elaborate lithograph plates. These were the first ‘images’ that a reading public in England would have had of the Zulu and their accounts certainly would define the popular conception (or mis-conception) of this distant culture. This would be an image, rightly or wrongly, from which historians over the next 150 years, would draw. More recent findings have led some researchers to question their often problematic depictions of the Zulu as exaggerated; motivated by commercial desires to promote the annexation of the region by the British Crown.¹

A letter, discovered in 1941, written by Nathanial Isaacs to Henry Fynn in which he gives publishing advice to Fynn, states: “Make them [the Zulu kings] out as bloodthirsty as you can, and describe the frivolous crimes people lose their lives for. It all tends to swell up the work and make it interesting.”² Fynn was one of the first explorers to arrive at Port Natal and had lived amongst the Zulu for some years documenting his experience in a diary. Fynn was looking to publish his diary in London when Isaacs wrote to him.

It is from Isaacs that we have the first, and one of the few, images of King Shaka, shown here in “battle-dress”.

Isaacs book was subsequently reviewed in the British weekly publication The Mirror of Literature, Amusement and Instruction³ in October 1836, which reprinted the now famous image of Shaka on its cover. Quoted in the review were selected texts from Isaacs’ account, including an initial meeting with Shaka:⁴

“… as usual we paid the king an early visit. We now expressed a wish to see him in his war dress; he immediately retired, and in a short time returned attired: his dress consists of monkeys’ skins, in three folds from his waist to the knee, from which two white cows tails are suspended as well as from each arm; round his head is a neat band of fur stuffed, in front of which is placed a tall feather, and on each side a variegated plume. He advanced with his shield, an oval about four feet in length, and an umconto, or spear, when his warriors commenced a war-song, and he began his maneuvers.”⁵

What, for me, is significant about this account is that Shaka does not choose to greet his guests dressed in his warrior attire (for obvious reasons, he was not at battle.) But rather it is the visitors, the Westerners, who desire to see him dressed as such.

This is then how Isaacs chooses to represent Shaka in the lithographs to the British public and it is this image of the male Zulu as warrior that is then imprinted on the imagination and continuously re-imaged in the West.

Though Shaka does not at first appear in his military dress for the visitors, in complying to their request he becomes a kind of participant in this projection of the warrior image for his so-called ‘other’. His performance as the warrior is an assertion of cultural pride and a legitimate affirmation of Zulu identity. Seen through Western eyes, though, this same action becomes a spectacle and a form of exoticism.

Thus comes into play a complex dance of “performing Zulu” for Western audiences, where actions and objects of significant cultural pride — the clothing; the weapons, such as the assegai and knobkerrie, the isihlangu or battle shield — are used by Westerners as signs to reinforce early stereotypes of the Zulu as “warlike and savage”.

Print was not the only medium to contribute to these problematic Western images of the Zulu in the 19th century. Further examples of Zulu culture as spectacle are discussed in Bernth Lindfors book, Africans on Stage, where, in the summer of 1853, A.T. and C. Caldecott brought thirteen Zulus by ship to London “for the purpose of exhibiting them to the British public.”⁶ The show included elaborate performances by the men in traditional warrior dress and was reported as one of the most popular shows in London at the time. Similarly, in 1879, William Hunt, also known as Farini, mounted shows concurrent with the Anglo-Zulu War of Zulu warriors performing in London.⁷

The Anglo-Zulu War of 1879, like no other event before it, brought British interests in Zululand, to the front pages of the international press. The various Zulu victories against the world’s then leading imperial army were often featured in papers like The New York Times. An article on February 12th after the battle of Isandlwana reads: “The news of the defeat caused a sensation throughout London. The demand for newspapers at all the suburban stations was greater than since the outbreak of the Franco-German War.”⁸ Another article from July 25th covers the eventual Zulu defeat at the battle of Ulundi and discusses possible outcomes for then Zulu King Cetshwayo.⁹

An interesting example of the extent to which the Zulu war caught the international attention is seen in this cigarette card series celebrating Australia’s preeminent annual horse race: the Melbourne Cup. The 1881 winner was a black colt named Zulu, here not only referencing the war but also signifying “blackness”.

After his defeat, King Cetshwayo, was captured and sent into exile at the Cape. In 1882 he petitioned Queen Victoria for an audience and was permitted to travel to London where he requested to be reinstated as Zulu King. Images from the time include Cetshwayo posing in traditional dress and subsequently photographed in Western attire while visiting London in 1882. In addition Queen Victoria offered to have his official portrait painted in “national dress”.

The image on the left shows Cetshwayo posing for a portrait in traditional attire taken probably around 1875. Interestingly he is posed in front of what appears to be a large canvas tarpaulin and seated on a Victorian wooden chair. This is also how he appears to be dressed in images showing him and his entourage aboard the ship Natal which took him into exile to Cape Town.¹⁰ The centre photograph taken by Alexander Bassano in 1882, while Cetshwayo was visiting London, shows him in Western clothing. While in London, Queen Victoria also offered her painter, Carl Sohn, to paint his official portrait in “national dress”. The painting was eventually sent on permanent loan by King George VI to the Old Town House in Durban.¹¹ Today it is part of the Local History Museum collection.

Cetshwayo also became the subject of the British satirical weekly magazine Punch. In this cartoon he is shown with a female entourage meeting British high society, in what I am assuming is a fictional account as the image appears to be dated from 1879, well before his 1882 visit.

Below Cetshwayo is depicted on a cigarette card issued ten years after the Anglo-Zulu war in 1889. The card comes from W.S. Kimball & Company’s crudely titled series Savage and Semi-Barbarous Chiefs and Rulers.

Allen & Ginter of Richmond, Virginia was one of the first cigarette companies to insert printed cards into their tobacco products as a way to stiffen the packaging and serve as a marketing device. Many subjects ranged from the quasi-educational to blatant propaganda. This set from 1887 explored the Arms of all Nations and included an image of a Zulu warrior with Assegai situated interestingly with other weapons from across the globe.

Some cards like this 1929 Churchman series titled Warriors of all Nations would include a paragraph of information on the back contextualizing, in part, the image on the front. Other cards like the 1888 Kinney Tobacco Company Military Series show a "Zulu Chief" erroneously as a child.

This Singer Sewing Machine trade card below dates from the 1890s. Trade cards were exchanged in social circles as a means of advertising businesses or products and first became popular in London in the 17th century. In many ways they are the pre-cursor to the modern day business card. This particular card shows a Zulu woman making an article of clothing on a sewing machine surrounded by her family. The text on the back suggests that it is the Singer Company that is literally bringing “civilization” through Western clothing to Zululand.

The turn of the century saw an explosion of postcards. Short messages could be sent at cheaper rates than letters. Visitors in foreign countries, in this way, would communicate with friends or loved-ones thereby disseminating mass produced “exotic” images across the globe. South Africa was no exception.

Early postcards however showed very little of the rapid industrialization of contemporary African life under colonial rule. Images of the Zulu, rather, referenced a pre-colonial ideal with thematic stereotypes that perpetuated, for the Western viewer, a romantic image of “native” life.

A number of companies produced postcards in South Africa in the early 1900s but none were as prolific as the Sallo Epstein Company of Durban.¹² These two postcards below are examples from Epstein's studio that show what appears to be Zulu musicians with a range of traditional and Western instruments including the stringed bow or umakweyana, a concertina and a mouth organ. The cancellation stamp on the rear of the right hand card dates it from January 28th, 1906. Interestingly, this image was also used on the cover of the compilation CD Squashbox: Le Concertina Zoulou et Sotho en Afrique Du Sud 1930-1965 issued in France on Silex Memoire in 1993.

The postcard also presented a new kind of Zulu image: the rickshaw or amalitha — introduced to Natal from Japan in 1893. The Zulu rickshaw is a particular adaptation of the Japanese rickshaw (meaning human power vehicle) which was probably developed in Japan around 1869. By 1904 there were over 2000 registered rickshaw pullers in Durban.

Though rickshaws were quite clearly the result of problematic colonial labour dynamics, the practice did foster a uniquely Zulu and vibrant sub-culture. The horns in the headdress, for example, are symbolic of the strength of the bull.¹³

Images of the Zulu rickshaw began to appear in international advertisements for travel to South Africa, reinforcing colonial fantasies for Western consumers. This 1935 US Time magazine advertises “A Zulu Warrior pulled my rickshaw” thus blurring and equating the rickshaw puller and Zulu warrior. The rickshaw is used again in a 1939 US Fortune Magazine advertisement seen below the Time magazine example.

The above image shows an earlier travel advertisement from Science magazine in the 1920s with a diagram of a Zulu warrior in “War Panoply”.


IMAGES IN THE RECORDING INDUSTRY

The earliest recordings of Zulu music date back to 1912 when the UK-based Gramophone Company sent a portable recording unit to South Africa and issued records on their Zonophone label. These included tracks by Impi To Sindiso, H. Selby Msimang, P. Mbonambi and J. Vilakazi.¹⁴ But field recordings were not the greatest quality and artists were frequently brought by boat to the recording studios in England.

Interestingly the first substantial body of Zulu recordings were made in London by James Stuart, a white, fluent Zulu linguist who was born in Pietermaritzburg in 1868. Stuart recorded at least 62 tracks, beginning in April 1927, that were primarily spoken word praise songs — or izibongo — dedicated to leaders like Shaka and Dingane. Of note Stuart was also one of the principles behind the eventual publication of Henry Fynn’s diary mentioned earlier. Much of Stuart's research is housed today at the Killie Campbell Africana Library in Durban. Stuart’s recording sessions were followed with those by Simon Sibiya and John Matthews Ngwane in 1929.¹⁵

But perhaps the most famous and successful Zulu recordings from this period come from the 1930 London sessions by Reuben T. Caluza’s Double Quartet. As Veit Erlmann so intricately reveals in his book African Stars, Caluza was South Africa’s first black ragtime composer and with his group recorded over 150 tracks for EMI. Caluza had been educated at John Dube’s Ohlange Institute and became a choral conductor and teacher there in 1915. In 1934 he graduated from the Hampton Institute in Virginia, USA followed by Columbia University before returning to South Africa to head the newly formed School of Music at Adams College outside Durban.¹⁶

With a growing resurgence in ethnic pride amongst the black elite, teachers, mostly alumni from Adams College, formed in 1929 “The Lucky Stars”, a vaudeville performance troupe that employed Zulu ethnic traditions and iconography in their shows.

The image above  is sourced from Veit Erlmann's African Stars and in the book he discusses the group and the times:

"The Lucky Stars gloried in “scenes of native domestic life with a realism which would be otherwise unobtainable. […] And although elite critics such as Herbert Dhlomo mocked the show as “exotic crudités,” Durban working-class audiences “perceived finer shades of relevant ethical significance, and relished the skillful dramatization of double-barreled purpose in each play. […] If the acceptance of ethnic traditions among black cultural leaders before the war and during much of the 1920s was never more than half-hearted, the 1930s saw significant changes in black attitudes towards tradition and ethnicity. Thus in 1932 Mark Radebe, leading musical ideologue and Johannesburg music critic, argued that a genuine national musical idiom had to be “based on the real Bantu Music, namely its folk music. […] In Natal, leaders like John Dube exerted a strong influence on African thinking about ethnic tradition; and both the Ohlange Institute and Adams college were instrumental in bringing educated elite into tune with the new policy. Thus it is by no means accidental that in terms of musical performance, the shift toward traditionalism first took shape at Adams and Ohlange […]"¹⁷

Columbia, another UK-based competitor of Gramophone Company had sent a mobile unit to South Africa in 1929 and then again in 1933. In the first issue of his African Music Society Newsletter (June 1948), ethnomusicologist, Hugh Tracey referred to Columbia recordings made by the Zululand War Dancers as excellent examples of ndhlamu dance — often featuring the ingoma drum or sometimes clapping. Tracey pointed out that the tracks were incorrectly referred to as "war dancers" and that the drum was erroneously mislabeled as a “tom-tom”. In the same issue he mentions Mameyiguda Zungu (on HMV), a stevedore in the Durban harbour, as being one of the best-known ndhlamu dance leaders in Durban.¹⁸

Ndhlamu or more broadly speaking ingoma dance as Erlmann points out, was one of the “most powerful symbols of working class Zulu identity” and had a strong tradition dating back to pre-colonial times. Ingoma dancing was for a time banned in Durban after practitioners of the form were linked to riots there in 1929. But through a process of negotiation and “domestication”, using weekly organized dance competitions, the art form was eventually adopted and promoted by White-owned businesses in Johannesburg (notably mining interests) and Durban.¹⁹

Though dance competitions had been staged in Johannesburg as early as 1921, a committee composed exclusively of whites allowed for the staging of the first “Natal Native Dancing Championships” in 1939 in which more than fifty ingoma teams participated. As Erlmann details in African Stars: “One of the most readily observable results of the restructuring of ingoma dance was the emergence of a completely new type of “traditional” dance regalia. Prior to the Dancing Championships most dance troupes in Durban had preferred vividly coloured cloth skirts and a cape-like shoulder covering over a pair of long trousers, vests, and car-tire sandals. When the white organizers of the spectacle suggested that more “traditional”-looking regalia be worn to enhance the visual aspect of the dancing with tourists, most teams readily adopted a completely different outfit of animal skins, sticks, and shields that now forms the standard ingoma “uniform”.²⁰

Though Erlmann maintains that the performers only donned the more traditional clothing at the request of the white organizers in 1939, quite clearly this image he sourced from the EMI archives shows Mameyiguda and his dance group dressed in traditional attire as early as 1933.

Not all critics, black or white, approved of the style. Ingoma dance was still viewed by some sectors of the black elite as a “vestige of the ‘uncivilised’, ‘heathen’ past that stood in the way of full integration into modern South African society.”²¹

The linking of traditional Zulu symbols with images of the industrial labor experience of working class blacks was also used as a marketing strategy to entice black consumers. Below, Gallo’s 78 rpm Singer sleeve from the early 1930s shows idyllic images of a Zulu warrior gazing over land (that ironically is no longer his) and a maiden fetching water; juxtaposed with ingoma dancers, in the distance, performing at the base a Johannesburg mine.

Incidentally, the image of the Zulu maiden fetching water in the lower right hand corner was also used in a 1930s series of ceramic plates marketed by the UK company, Royal Doulton. These photographs were circulated across a range of media at the time. Another image from the plate series, showing a Zulu woman (Mdabuli) at the entrance of a hut, was sourced from the 1927 Italian film Siliva Zulu and were taken by the team's anthropologist Lidio Cipriani.²² Similarly an image of a Zulu warrior in the plate series, like that of Mdabuli, was also featured on postcards.

Another 78 rpm sleeve, on the Shaya label from the 1940s, shows a more considered design with a jazz pianist, as contemporary urban performer, merging with what was becoming the most iconic symbols of Zulu identity: the isihlangu or shield, assegai and knobkerrie. The target audience here was principally black middle-class consumers. The Shaya label, owned by African Electrical Recording Industries, in the mid 1940s, under Arthur Harris, condensed their name to Recording Industries, or RI, before becoming Trutone Industries in 1949.

In 1952 Hugh Tracey would document the ingoma dances that were now becoming huge tourist attractions, in his book African Dances of the Witwatersrand Gold Mines. The book was complemented with accompanying 10” records released by Decca, under Tracey’s Music of Africa series and issued in South Africa, the UK and USA. Notice the design on the cover linking the ingoma dancer with the iconic image of the Johannesburg gold mine.

Like the earlier postcards, this Trutone souvenir record cover from 1956 uses a number of images to happily market South Africa to tourist visitors. Photographs of traditional life such as the Zulu maiden reed dance are juxtaposed with a range of eclectic images crudely depicting the black South African experience. Notably, the music on the compilation paints a rather different picture and for the most part features a sampling of contemporary urban styles such as jazz, jive and kwela.

These 1958 LPs were designed specifically for white audiences and the international market. The UK Columbia issue on the left shows a Zulu maiden dance from what I believe is the annual Shembe religious festival, but here decontextualized. On the right is the US issue with a different title: Music of the African Zulus. Misleading in that not all the music on the compilation is Zulu, nor is it religious or traditional, but rather quite eclectic, contemporary and urban. Interestingly the women’s naked breasts here have been edited with additional in-studio decorative clothing, perhaps suggesting a sensitive shift from the earlier exploitative approach seen in the postcards. However, I suspect this may have had more to do with censorship and “wholesome” marketing in the international context.

Below are examples of record covers exploiting in varied degrees the image of the colonial Zulu rickshaw. The bottom right image shows a more critical and interesting application of the rickshaw image here used satirically on the 1980s debut album of alternative band the Kalahari Surfers.

In the 1960s the apartheid government began to implement major parts of its Separate Development policy. This involved the establishment of separate homeland regions within the borders of the South Africa as "independent countries" based on ethnic and language divisions within the black population. These included Transkei, Ciskei, Venda, KwaZulu, and so on. This 1964 pamphlet below, issued by the South African Information Service in the United States, illustrates quite blatantly, I believe, their motives behind this strategy.²³ By dividing the black population into ethnic language groups the government created the false impression that the white community was in the majority. Ironically whites are not broken down into their ethnic language groups such as Afrikaans, English, Jewish, Greek etc.

Similarly in 1960 the government launched a number of separate, state-run, language-based broadcasting stations under the umbrella of Radio Bantu. These divisions included Radio Zulu, Radio Lebowa, Radio Setswana, etc., and their purpose was to exploit regional differences and promote ethnic identification. Cross-exchange between languages was forbidden, only Zulu could be spoken or performed on Radio Zulu, and so on.²⁴ The main goal was to discourage a cross-cultural, united African identity that could and eventually would destroy the apartheid state.

This strategy had an impact on record companies who were only assured radio play if they recorded and marketed musicians on ethnic lines. Not only were black musicians encouraged to restrict their lyrics to a particular language, but albums marketed ethnicity. Thus it was common for covers to include the ethnicity of the group, in addition to the particular music genre, for example “Zulu traditional”, “Sotho vocal”, “Zulu disco”, and so on.²⁵ As can be viewed on the 1971 Zulu Vocal album and two LPs by Babsy Mlangeni below.

Ironically, unforeseen by the government, this strategy generated a whole popular resurgence in neo-traditional music styles in the 1970s and early 80s.

Images with Zulu iconography are almost absent from most South African records in the 1960s, save for those issued under Hugh Tracey’s ILAM label. The first records that reintroduce Zulu ethnic symbols began to appear in the early 1970s. Of note is Welcome Msomi’s critically acclaimed play Umabatha - The Zulu Macbeth that became a huge success in 1972 and travelled internationally. This record was only recorded and issued in 1975, however.

Another example that also toured globally was the 1974 exploitative musical Ipi-Tombi produced by Bertha Egnos, considered by many to be propaganda for the apartheid government.

Interestingly plays like these fostered a positive reassessment of “traditional symbols” as David Coplan points out:

“A last issue of concern to township playwrights during the Struggle period was the proper role of indigenous historical culture in town and township theatre. On the one hand, urban cultural disorientation, social disintegration, and the philosophy of Black Consciousness fostered the positive reassessment of the ‘traditional’ among urban Africans. On the other hand, the success of Welcome Msomi’s Zulu Macbeth, U-Mabatha, and of exploitative displays of African tradition by white producers, Ipi Tombi, nonetheless inspired township playwrights to blend traditional music, dance, and divination scenes into their plays. The verdict of township audiences on these attempts was that ‘traditionality’ was acceptable, even rousingly effective, provided it was done ‘authentically’ - in a manner recognizable from rural community performance - and with expertise.”²⁶

From 1975 on there is an explosion of records by groups re-introducing ethnic iconography and depictions of the rural experience on their covers. As shown here for example by the Queue Sisters and Mthembu Queens. Curiously the later cover shows the group in traditional dress on the front and contemporary urban clothing on the back.

A major pioneer of the Zulu neo-traditional style of music known as maskanda was John Bengu, also known as Phuzushukela (literally meaning sugar drinker). As Rob Allingham reveals, Bhengu who, with his distinctive finger-picking, guitar style, started out as a street performer in Durban in the late 1940s, before making his first records at Troubadour around 1955. In 1968 Bhengu moved to Trutone and then worked for a short period with producer Cambridge Matiwane, who may have been instrumental in getting him to perform with a backing band, a notable departure for maskanda music at that time. These recordings were also his first to use the name Phuzushukela. In 1971, Bhengu moved to GRC, where producer Hamilton Nzimande electrified his sound. The combination of traditional maskanda with the heavy bass lines of mbaqanga produced a product that was irresistible and a formulae that remained for the next 30 years.²⁷ Given that I have none of his early records it is difficult to say at what point Bhengu chose to present himself in traditional Zulu dress on his covers, but this cassette above is from 1977. While this record, Sehlule Umkhomazi, dating from 1982 is his last.

Likewise other maskanda artists styled after Bengu, like Moses Mchunu and Philemon Zulu, began producing hit records in an explosion of Zulu neo-traditional music from the mid 1970s to early 80s.

The group that put maskanda on the global map was Juluka with their 1979 debut LP Universal Man. The interracial team of Johnny Clegg and Sipho Mchunu defied apartheid orthodoxy and the album was banned from radio play. Here the two pose on a mine dump with the name of the band, which means sweat in Zulu, engraved in a gold bar — alluding to the migrant labor that built Johannesburg.²⁸

On Juluka’s second album African Litany, Mchunu is shown attaching a bangle to Clegg's arm and as Michael Drewett in Composing Apartheid points out: “These images strongly dismissed the apartheid policy of racial separation and mistrust and accordingly disrupted the apartheid fiction”.²⁹

Other albums show the group performing the ingoma stamping dance, continuing the tradition made famous by artists like Mameyiguda in the 1930s.

Below are more examples of covers by other maskanda groups from the 1980s.

Finally, maskanda was not the only Zulu traditional music form, other styles include the a cappella vocal tradition, isicathamiya made famous first by Solomon Linda’s Original Evening Birds in 1939 and then by one of South Africa’s most well-known and successful groups — Ladysmith Black Mambazo.

Their debut LP, Amabutho, in 1973 became a major success and was one of the first records by black artists to go ‘gold’ in South Africa. Between 1973 and 1986 they would release at least twelve hit records locally before collaborating with Paul Simon on his historic Graceland album and becoming international stars

Interestingly Ladysmith Black Mambazo’s use of traditional Zulu iconography on the covers of their locally produced albums, prior to the collaboration with Paul Simon, seems quite discreet except for one album, Shintsha Sithothobala, which shows the group dressed as Zulu rickshaws.³⁰

When LBM's records began to be marketed in the US and Europe by Shanachie Records in 1984 an image of the group in Zulu traditional dress was chosen for the cover. Likewise for their hit with Paul Simon, “Homeless”.

Other albums issued internationally by companies, such as Shanachie and Rounder Records, since then have used similar marketing strategies.

This leads me to the question of whether the artists here have agency in the decision making of how they are imaged on their album covers? Or is this something determined by the record company? Moreover, does the adoption of Zulu traditional iconography in these contexts reinforce ethnic pride on a global scale or does it simply pander to those old stereotypes established in the Western media by Nathaniel Isaacs and others so long ago in the days of Shaka?


FINAL THOUGHTS

In closing, the Zulu maskanda tradition continues to be hugely popular in South Africa and was throughout the 1990s. Artists like Phuzekhemisi (medicine drinker), or more recently Izingane Zoma, came to prominence not only for great music but also for controversial and political themes critiquing aspects of contemporary Zulu life.

Zulu iconography also emerged in other genres for example on this 1986 solo jazz record, Village Dance, by iconic bassist Sipho Gumede. Here he embraces his Zulu roots in red “hot pants”.

And again on his classic 1994 LP Down Freedom Avenue, where the traditional Zulu shield and weapons have been transformed, through an almost logo-like design, into an iconic brand.

More recently, Zulu traditions continue to be adapted and readapted. For example hip-hop artist Zuluboy samples maskanda guitar for his own brand of “skandi-hop”.

NOTES

1. Wylie, Dan. 2006. Myth of Iron: Shaka in History, University of KwaZulu Natal Press, Durban; reviewed in: Rory Carroll, "Shaka Zulu's brutality was exaggerated, say new book", The Guardian online, May 21, 2006.
2. Oakes, Dougie, (ed.) 1989. Illustrated History of South Africa: The Real Story, Reader's Digest, Cape Town, p. 87.
3. "The Zoolus of Eastern Africa" in the The Mirror of Literature, Amusement and Instruction, London, No. 799, October 8, 1836.
4. The meeting is between Lt. King, his party and Shaka and his described in King's diary. Isaacs in his book quotes extensively from King's diary as that text had come into his possession after King had died at Port Natal.
5. Isaacs, Nathaniel. 1836. Travels and Adventures in Eastern Africa, Descriptive of the Zoolus, Their Manners, Customs, with A Sketch of Natal, Edward Churton, London, p. 60-61.
6. Lindfors, Bernth (ed.) 1999. Africans on Stage: Studies in Ethnological Show Business, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, p. 62.
7. Ibid., p. 81.
8. "The Victory of the Zulus", The New York Times, New York, February 12, 1879.
9. "The Battle of Ulundi", The New York Times, New York, July 25, 1879.
10. Photographs of Cetshwayo and his entourage on the ship Natal were shown in the exhibition: Distance and Desire: Encounters with the African Archive Part III: Poetics and Politics, curated by Tamar Garb at The Walther Collection Project Space, New York, March 22 - May 18, 2013. The exhibition was reviewed in the blog: Art Blat.
11. Binns, C.T. 1963. The Last Zulu King, Longmans, London, p. 190.
12. Nicholson, Martin P. 1996. Catalogue of the Postcards of Southern Africa: Volume 1 - Sallo Epstein, self-published, Northants, UK.
13. An observation noted in more detail by Sandra Klopper during the "Global Zulu" panel discussion.
14. I am indebted to Alan Kelly for his tireless research on the Gramophone Company discography and for graciously sending me his notes on the Zonophone T-series.
15. Ibid.
16. Erlmann, Veit. 1991. African Stars: Studies in Black South African Performance, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, p. 121.
17. Ibid. p. 77.
18. Tracey, Hugh (ed.) 1948. "Records of African Music", African Music Society Newsletter, Roodepoort, Vol. 1, No. 1, July 1948, p. 26.
19. Erlmann, Veit. 1991. African Stars: Studies in Black South African Performance, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, p. 96.
20. Ibid. p. 108-109.
21. Ibid. p. 106.
22. As noted in the exhibition: Siliva Zulu: Silent Pictures Telling Stories, curated by Fiona Clayton, Gerald Klinghardt, and Lalou Meltzer, Iziko Slave Lodge, Cape Town,  2011-2012
23. The Republic of South Africa: 300 Years of Progress, pamphlet issued by the South African Government Information Service, New York, 1964.
24. Drewett, Michael. 2008. "Packaging Desires: Album covers and the Presentation of Apartheid" in Grant Olwage (ed.), Composing Apartheid: Music For and Against Apartheid, Wits University Press, Johannesburg, p. 128.
25. Ibid.
26. Coplan, David B. 2007. In Township Tonight: Three Centuries of South African Black City Music and Theatre, Jacana, Johannesburg, p. 276.
27. Allingham, Rob. 1990. Liner notes to the CD Singing in an Open Space: Zulu Rhythm and Harmony 1962-1982, Rounder Records, Cambridge, MA.
28. Michael Drewett quotes Richard Pithouse in "Packaging Desires: Album covers and the Presentation of Apartheid" in Grant Olwage (ed.), Composing Apartheid: Music For and Against Apartheid, Wits University Press, Johannesburg, 2008, p. 130.
29. Drewett, Michael. 2008. "Packaging Desires: Album covers and the Presentation of Apartheid" in Grant Olwage (ed.), Composing Apartheid: Music For and Against Apartheid, Wits University Press, Johannesburg, p. 130.
30. Twelve LBM's record covers are shown on the back of their Intokoza LP, Ezomdabu (BL 205), Gallo, Johannesburg, 1980.