The passing of Mama Afrika
“I never understood why I couldn’t come home,” she had said. “I never committed any crime.”
South African singer Miriam Makeba died following a performance in Italy last night. She was 76 and had been in failing health for some time.
In the late 1950s, Makeba, already a star in Africa, arrived in London, where she met up with Harry Belafonte, who gave her career a boost in the US. In 1960, she attempted to return to Johannesburg for the funeral of her mother, and was told that her passport had been revoked; after she testified before the United Nations about the nature of apartheid, her citizenship was summarily canceled as well. It was 1990 before she returned to South Africa, at the request of Nelson Mandela.
Few of her recordings gained traction in the States: she did an early version of Solomon Linda’s “Mbube,” which eventually mutated into “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” and she scored a pop hit with the bouncy trifle “Pata Pata” in 1967. I remember a particularly heartfelt cover of Dylan’s “I Shall Be Released,” circa 1969. And she went back to her Xhosa roots (on her father’s side) with the international hit “The Click Song.” In 2005 she went on her farewell tour; this weekend’s performance was a benefit for Italian writer Roberto Saviano, who has chronicled organized crime in his native Naples and has been threatened for so doing. Activist to the last, she was.
Tatyana »
10 November 2008 · 8:57 am
These two sentences collide.
“I never understood why I couldn’t come home” and “Activist to the last, she was”.
Actions have consequences. She contributed into destruction of a beautiful country – she had to pay. Regretfully, the racists who are finally came to power in South Africa, aren’t paying.
Kay Dennison »
10 November 2008 · 9:15 am
There’s a lot I’d like to say but I’m going to be good and say: May the Gods be good to her.