Music has always been a unifier, bringing together people of different races, cultures, and creeds into common ground. It’s one of the things I like most about it, and it’s a beautiful thing. People that wouldn’t normally talk to each other in any other setting suddenly find themselves dancing with a person totally different from them at a concert, and a friendship is born. So imagine the power that music has on a racially tense, ethnically challenged, fragmented society like South Africa’s. Here is a 7 strong band diverse in color and culture, with members black and white, from Zimbabwe to Mozambique to South Africa, jamming and dancing together to the same beat, creating bliss.

Freshlyground is the hottest musical act in southern Africa and has been for awhile. It’s afro-pop mixed with jazz, blues, dub, and traditional South African music. They recently wreaked havoc at the Luanda Jazz Festival, with my older brother saying they were perhaps the most popular performance there. So much so that my younger brother, who recently returned to the states from Luanda, brought with him nothing less than Freshlyground’s outstanding second album, Nomvula. It was an album that I yearned for, having heard their first single Doo Bee Doo a couple of years ago by suggestion of my cousin who lives in Cape Town. It’s a feel good, no worries sort of tune that will stay with you long after you stopped hearing, because it also happens to be insanely catchy.

But what I like most about Freshlyground, besides the depth and intelligence of their music, is of course the throaty, distinctive voice of its lead singer, South African Zolani Mahola. I mean, really! Listen to that voice! Her voice puts an already diverse musical sound into another level altogether. It reaches its zenith in I’d Like, a beautiful, beautiful song that is as sentimental as it is amorous, and which most of my extended family had the pleasure of seeing live (yes, I might still be bitter about missing the Luanda Jazz Festival).The end of the song climaxes in a stunning blend of violin and flute, played by band members Kyla Rose Smith (violin) and Simon Atwell on the flute. Lastly there is Nomvula (After the Rain) sung entirely in Xhosa, one of South Africa’s native languages. In it Zolani sings about her youth in a motherless environment and the strength and resilience of her father, but the song might as well be in English because the emotion poring through doesn’t need translation. Press play and enjoy South Africa’s finest.

Doo Bee Doo
I'd Like
Nomvula