An Evening With Belafonte/Makeba

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Editorial reviews

Amazon.co.uk Review
Record producers often hit the jackpot when they rerelease an ancient classic, and such is emphatically the case with the 37-year-old hit LP An Evening with Belafonte/Makeba. This was an inspired pairing at the time, and feels no less inspired now. Harry Belafonte's career had begun in the theatre, moved on to pop and thence to the archives of folk music; Miriam Makeba had begun her career in South African jazz and moved on to protest music, earning herself the distinction of being one of her country's first famous musical exiles; her work with the American protest movement subsequently earned her a similar accolade from the American authorities. But here they are in their heyday, singing a wonderfully beguiling string of African songs, some of them muted expressions of sadness (the young Kenyan prevented by poverty from marrying his sweetheart), some of oppression ("Hurry mama, hide--the police are on their way"), and some proclaiming the Zulus' determination to fight back. But what strikes you now is the charm with which everything is expressed, and the graceful economy of the accompaniments--sometimes a lone guitar, often a Zulu choir. All comes from the heart, but all is the soul of decorum. --Michael Church

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Customer reviews

review by: date: 2004-10-22 rating:
Belafonte and Makeba, a classic folk pairing from 1965.
Forty years have passed since Harry Belafonte and Miriam Makeba first educated their adoring fans about life in South Africa under apartheid, revealing through songs sung entirely in Xhosa, Zulu, Sotho, and Swahili what life was like for black South Africans. Much has changed since then, with South Africa now governed by their black constituency, but the messages and the music from the sixties live on in this wonderful collaboration, which recognizes universal hopes and dreams and reflects the longings of all people for freedom.

If one were to listen to the songs without looking at the liner notes, one would comment on the melding of Makeba's clear, reedy voice with the whispery, mellow tones of Belafonte, giving their duets a unique sound, blending her forcefulness with his quiet strength. The use of minimal accompaniment, often only bongos, harmonica, drums, and guitar, grounds the vocal sound in reality and creates a mood. Most of the songs are protest songs, the protest often a quiet recognition of wrongs, rather than a call to action, which is implied.

Most memorable for me are "Thula, Thula," one of Belafonte's major hits, a Zulu song which sounds like a lullaby but which is actually a song by boys confined to reform school, saying "Hush, Mama," and "Lullaby," another Belafonte solo, a Zulu song in which a grandparent or father tells a child, "Don't cry, your mother is coming." Makeba solos with "To Those We Love," a song of African leaders confined to prison-Sobukwe, Luthuli, and Mandela-whose names ring out from prison. Like several other songs in Xhosa, this one is characterized by the Xhosa "clicks," a unique part of the language.

Several songs use the "call and reply" technique-"In the Land of the Zulus," sung by Makeba, which means "I'll never go to Lululand again, for this is where my father died," with echoes from a male chorus, and in "My Angel," by Makeba and Belafonte (in Swahili), the song of a young man from Kenya, too poor to marry his sweetheart. "Give Us Our Land," a Zulu song, and "Beware, Verwoerd," are warnings to the white world that the black man is on the move. Other songs are rooted in stories of young men going to work in the mines, and warnings from children to their mothers to hide, that the police are on the way.

Passionate and controlled, Belafonte and Makeba transcend the "protest movement" of the sixties with an album which is as relevant today as it was when it was recorded and performed around the world a generation ago. Mary Whipple

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