Paul Simon at 67 years old.
Just a bit of history on the music by Ladysmith Black Mambazo. The style is called "isicathamiya", which is derived from the word ""ukucothoma", which means to walk on your tip-toes. So, what would happen in the South African mines was that Zulu dancers wishing to dance and sing at night had to keep noise level downs. So they would sing and dance on the hush. Voices would be lowered and dance moves would also be softer. So they would go tippity-toe, tippity-toe, tippity-toe when dancing.
The singing would also go "hush, hush, hush", emphasizing harmony over loud sound. Over time, all this evolved from full-on and hushed-down Zulu dance and song to "Isicathamiya". The style is also known as "ingoma-busuku", which literally means the "dance of the night", as this was done in the night, as already explained. A new genre was then born and there were frequent meets where bands would get together and compete for a prize.
Prizes included all sort of things, including livestock! The bands were known by the names of the town where the founding members came from. They took pride in representing their hometowns. South Africa had a mingrant labour system, with young men leaving their hometowns to go work in gold mines in Johannesburg. Upon arrival, people would typically meet up with their homeboys in Johannesburg. In fact even the move to Johannesburg would come after the parents of the person hoping to move had been convinced that the person had someone to look after him in Johannesburg.
The new arrivals would then be shown the ropes and from time to time, Ingoma-busuku bands would be formed so the men would have something to do on weekends. Practice would be during the week and competitions would be on weekends.There was some travelling involved, but the distances were manageable. Ladysmith Black Mambazo was formed in the same way at the behest of Joseph Shabalala, by young men coming fromt the town of Ladysmith (eMnambithi), in the province of KwaZulu-Natal. Only, they were eventually considered to be too good and they were not allowed to enter competitions! Go figure.?
When Simon was younger.
[video=youtube_share;Fmf9ZJ_Yn0A]https://youtu.be/Fmf9ZJ_Yn0A[/video]
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