It sounds like a great idea, doesn’t it, to hold a festival of African- mostly East African- music in one of the world’s most exotic locales, Zanzibar?Land of spice and Islam, these island nations were the mix-and-mingle point for Africans, Arabs, Persians, Portuguese and maybe even Zheng He.There are only a few problems with the brilliant idea.The first is one of power- not political or economic or religious- but simple electricity, or lack thereof.Zanzibar doesn’t have any, except that generated by thousands of generators converting petrol into 220 volts of electricity.It sounds wasteful, doesn’t it?Since the main need is light, why not just burn petrol as the Brits did until the 1930’s?
The second problem is site location, the cramped and dangerously congested Old Arab Fort.It’s beautiful, but a disaster waiting to happen, what with vendors in makeshift booths using open flames to light their unstable tables.Meanwhile a contiguous amphitheater lies empty.DUH.Considering that problem number three is the annoying down time between single-stage sets and the resulting short set-times, it seems like someone might come up with the brilliant idea to alternate between the two stages, thus spreading out the crowd and moving things right along, too.Considering that video screens are already there and in use, such a plan is easily conceivable.What it takes in extra lights and equipment could easily be saved in recovered down-time.I’d hate to see what might happen if a fire broke out in the over-packed space, IN DARKNESS, crowd scrambling for only two narrow hard-to-find exits.But the show must go on, of course.
Ah, the show, now that’s the good part.Disgusted by the logistical snafus of both show and city- power off all day is wasted time all day, after one day at least, and power off at night is downright dangerous, I decided that I just couldn’t sacrifice more than one full day and two evenings of my life to this project… but what I saw was eminently enjoyable, and I don’t mean just the stars, either.I saw five acts each of the first two evenings, and I think that those would be representative of the talent available.The first evening started for me with Ikwani Safaa Musical Club from Zanzibar itself, a classic (if not ‘classical’) Swahili group that featured Tamalyn Dallal belly-dancing exquisitely.Kenyans Maia von Lekow with a very nice and focused jazz touch and Makadem with a broader modern eclectic sound going in a lot of lyrical and musical directions- not unlike the US’s Ozomatli- also made for some fine listening.Now I missed a couple of acts at the opening of the evening and one at the end featuring the local ‘jumbe’ dance music, but I’d say that my favorite act the first evening would have to be Jimmy Omonga from DR Congo.Now anything creative coming out of the DR Congo these days is to be heavily congratulated, because the DRC is NOT in good shape politically and socially.But these guys don’t need a handicap.Four guys played drums and sang while five dancers danced nonstop their entire almost-hour-long set.Now if that sounds boring, it’s not.The drummers may have been wearing what looked like their wives feather dusters turned upside down, but the dancers were scarily exotic in flowing robes, bare midriffs, ethnic pancake makeup, and one was even wearing a lightbulb- wishful thinking?You had to be there.
The next evening I resolved to arrive a bit earlier to catch the opening act, and was well rewarded.The very first act was a group of disabled performers, including two dancers up front that kept me fighting back tears.These two guys, who’ve probably spent their whole lives hearing names like “Flipper” and “Tuna Boy” directed at them from cruel buddies, not only danced their hearts out with gymnastics and acrobatics, but were… SO… HAPPY… doing it.How could I have ever bemoaned my own fate of such comparatively minor handicaps?The band itself I didn’t even realize was disabled until the set was over, so that says something.The music was that good, that I wasn’t compensating for their disabilities in my mind, ‘handicapping’ them, so to speak.They may not be the next Benda Billi, but then again they just may.A group called ‘Swahili Encounters’ was next and did a really nice job of offering a balanced palette of music from a variety of African countries, reflecting the origins of their members, and including the Swahili coast.Maureen Lupo Lilanda of Zambia then delivered some nice enough Afro-pop, but which seems to be depending on her star-power-which she may or may not have- to deliver the knock-out punch.For me African music is not at its best in that star-based context, but rather in a broader music-based one, but that may just be me.
The evening’s big star, though, was the next performer Malick Pathe’ Sow, currently a hot item on the world-music circuit, who delivered an exquisite performance, but did something which I feel deserves mention, if not an explanation.After an excruciatingly long time for set-up and sound-check- mostly due to Zanzibar’s power problems, Malick FINALLY started his set, played one song, and then walked off stage with his band for a 10-15 minute ‘prayer’ break.HUH?Am I hallucinating?Now I respect a man’s religion whatever it might be, but I also respect the rights of the audience.If a Muslim can’t miss his evening prayers, then he should book his set around it.I didn’t see anyone else praying… IN MUSLIM ZANZIBAR!That’s what mosques are for.The set was brilliant, though. Malick promoters, beware- read the rider carefully!Since the next performer, Mari Boine from Norway, wasn’t really exciting me; and the evening’s other big name, Ba Cissoko from Guinea, I’ve already seen; and the evening was hopelessly behind schedule by now, I decided to call it an evening and go back to my hotel.Fortunately they have escorts for you through the darkness for a buck or two, which I probably wouldn’t want to wait until the last minute for.Let me know when you get your power problems solved, Zanzibar, and maybe I’ll be back- and recommend it to others.Until then, I’ll just listen to the MP3’s.You’re pressing your luck.Beware the law of large numbers.
