Results for "Hugh Masekela"

Hugh Masekela

Born: April 4, 1939

Hugh Masekela was a world-renowned flugelhornist, trumpeter, bandleader, composer, singer and defiant political voice who remained deeply connected at home, while his international career sparkled. He was born in the town of Witbank, South Africa in 1939. At the age of 14, the deeply respected advocator of equal rights in South Africa, Father Trevor Huddleston, provided Masekela with a trumpet and, soon after, the Huddleston Jazz Band was formed. Masekela began to hone his, now signature, Afro-Jazz sound in the late 1950s during a period of intense creative collaboration, most notably performing in the 1959 musical King Kong, written by Todd Matshikiza, and, soon thereafter, as a member of the now legendary South African group, the Jazz Epistles (featuring the classic line up of Kippie Moeketsi, Abdullah Ibrahim and Jonas Gwangwa). In 1960, at the age of 21 he left South Africa to begin what would be 30 years in exile from the land of his birth

Abdullah Ibrahim: 1934–2026

by Kofi Adjepong-Boateng
June 18, 2026

Abdullah Ibrahim , the South African pianist, composer and bandleader, died in Bavaria, Germany, on 15 June 2026. He was born Adolph Johannes Brand in Cape Town on 9 October 1934. Frail but undimmed, Ibrahim last performed on 27 March at the Cape Town International Jazz Festival, in the city that made him.

The Life and Times of South African Jazz

by Philip Songa
June 16, 2026

This article was first published on All About Jazz in January 2004. South Africa has always been a little different from other countries on the African continent. That uniqueness has extended in many directions, but South Africa (SA) is uniquely remembered in the world as the only country to have suffered from apartheid. Despite, ...

Eric Bell: Vulnerability

by Pierre Giroux
December 15, 2024

Eric Bell's debut album Vulnerability is an exploration of artistry, creativity and respect for jazz traditions. Accompanied by his regular partners bassist Cole Sainburg and drummer Nico Vasquez along with special guests guitarist Dean Anbar and tenor saxophonist Eric Hirschhorn, Bell delivers a compelling performance, balancing the weight of jazz history with an innovative spirit. The ...

The Abdullah Ibrahim Trio at 92NY

by Paul Reynolds
November 22, 2024

The Abdullah Ibrahim Trio 92NY New York, NY November 18, 2024 South Africa arguably offers the headiest jazz brew found beyond the borders of the U.S. And since the 2018 death of trumpeter Hugh Masekela, the undisputed elder statesman of the nation's jazz has been Masekela's former '50s Johannesburg band mate, ...

Clod Ensemble + Nu Civilisation Orchestra At Barbican Theatre

by Chris May
September 22, 2024

Clod Ensemble + Nu Civilisation Orchestra Barbican Theatre The Black Saint And The Sinner LadyLondon September 19, 2024 We will never know exactly what Charles Mingus meant by the title of his suite The Black Saint And The Sinner Lady (Impulse!, 1963). Indeed, Mingus himself may not have ...

Amina Figarova & Matsiko World Orphan Choir: Suite For Africa

by Dan McClenaghan
July 12, 2024

Happenstance played a hand in two of pianist Amina Figarova's finest recordings. The first time around it was September Suite (Munich Records, 2005). Though based in the Netherlands at the time, Figarova was staying in New York City when the planes flew into the World Trade Center buildings on September 11th, 2001. The music for the ...

Malcolm Jiyane Tree-O: True Story

by Chris May
May 31, 2024

One of the minor but intriguing mysteries of modern culture is why the trombone is commonplace in African American music yet only rarely heard in Africa itself. Since its earliest days, jazz in the US has featured the trombone, as did ska in Jamaica. In analog-age samba and bossa nova in Brazil, the instrument was practically ...

Angles + Elle-Kari With Strings: The Death Of Kalypso

by Chris May
May 18, 2024

As a genre, jazz-opera is thinly populated. The recorded archive is marked more by quality than quantity, with albums by Mike Westbrook and Kate Westbrook, Carla Bley and Charlie Haden to the fore. But the best ever jazz-opera, in this parish anyway, predates anything by these musicians. Composer Todd Matshikiza and lyricist Pat Williams' King Kong ...

Hugh Masekela: Grazing In The Grass

by Chris May
January 27, 2024