Mozambicans Timbila Muzimba promise to continue tradition

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Mozambicans Timbila Muzimba promise to continue tradition

5:30 CAT | 28 Jul 2018

Photo: Lusa

Mozambican band Timbila Muzimba, who have the same performed for 20 years at the ‘Músicas do Mundo’ Festival in Sines in Portugal, promise to carry on “giving continuity” to the country’s musical tradition.

“It has been 20 years of learning. We came from a region where our parents always played, and taught us to play. We are carrying on the tradition,” band member Celso Mahuaie (timbila, percussions, mbira, vocals) said in an interview with Lusa after the concert on Thursday.

Just as their parents transmitted the musical tradition to them, so are they teaching their children and other young people. “There are 20 years ahead, of course. I think perhaps 100 years! Just the power of the instrument that we use, the mbira [an instrument of the xylophone family], has come from many years ago. It has always been played, has always passed from generation to generation,” he points out, noting that the instrument is used to accompany ceremonies in memory of the ancestors.

Mozambique is “a country that is culturally very intense, with many different cultural strains – a country made up of different ethnic groups. When you join this [diversity] together, it’s a very strong orchestra,” Mahuaie says.

This cultural “density” should be valued by politics. “Our grandparents … if we listen to the songs that they have been playing since 1938, they always criticise the local chiefs through music … [agitating] for change.” This necessary change “is in terms of development in general”, he summarises.

The band of eight musician-dancers sang a poem by the Portuguese Miguel Torga, mixed with texts by the Mozambican Paulina Chiziane. “We really enjoy literature. Here, we did an assemblage of great writers from here and the great writers of Mozambique,” Mahuaie explains.

On a European tour for a month, the Timbila Muzimba were at the Mimo Festival in Amarante before Sines and will go on to Belgium before returning to Mozambique.

Source: Lusa