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Psychedelic guitars, Latin grooves and urban carnival beats – the label Analog Africa, in collaboration with the Goethe-Institut, has unearthed rare recordings from the sixties and seventies in Angola, and for this achievement it was awarded the German Record Critics’ Prize. By Otiniel Silva

In 1961 armed groups in Africa launched an uprising against the Portuguese colonial power, which ended in 1975, one year after the Portuguese Carnation Revolution, with Angola’s declaration of independence. Is it possible that this era of struggle was actually the “golden age of Angolan music”, as the American historian Marissa Moorman writes in the liner notes to Angola Soundtrack?



Yes, she says, for it was during this era that the musseques, the townships of the city that later became Angola’s capital, evolved into a breeding ground for a sense of community among the people who flocked here from all regions of the country. This urban cultural language derives from the diverse cultural backgrounds that mingled here, as well as from the music that reached Luanda from Europe, the USA or the Caribbean. The electric guitar, symbol of the worldwide sixties revolution in pop music, came into contact here with traditional instruments and rhythms from all parts of the country – and a new sound was born: Rebita, Kazukata or Semba – the soundtrack of modern Angola.

This unique sound did, of course, have precursors, but recordings from the fifties, for example, are only to be found, if at all, in radio archives. Records have only been produced in Angola since the sixties. Unearthing them after forty years was an adventure in itself, writes Samy Ben Redjeb, head of the Frankfurt record label Analog Africa, in the liner notes to the CD. Angola Soundtrack is the ninth production of the label that has specialised in discovering forgotten recordings – and, as Samy Ben Redjeb assures us, it was the most difficult up to now. In the expansive and well researched booklet there is an abundance of information about the participating bands and musicians, while Ben Redjeb relates fascinating stories about the encounters, contacts, coincidences, setbacks and successes, visa problems, logistic catastrophes, horrific costs and a bout of food poisoning that plastered his path to the coveted original recordings.



On São Tomé e Príncipe, the smallest Portuguese island state in the Gulf of Guinea, which traditionally maintains strong cultural ties to Angola, he managed to persuade a radio DJ to send out an appeal to the population. They should take a look around to see if any of those “little black discs that your father was always playing” were gathering dust at home. Only seconds later the telephone rang in the studio. His efforts were finally rewarded in Luanda by the encounter with Zé Keno, the guitarist of the legendary band Os Jovens Do Prenda, with whose help Ben Redjeb was able not only to compile an impressive collection of records, but also to meet in person almost all the composers of the selected songs. The 18 titles on the Angola Soundtrack were chosen from hundreds of original singles that are now stored in Frankfurt am Main for further digitalisation. Particularly gratifying is that the CD not only offers spectacular, intoxicating, rarely heard music, but in the exhaustively edited and richly illustrated booklet it also supplies a wealth of information on the bands and musicians as well as on their historical, economic and cultural backgrounds.



Spurred on by the success of the sampler, which shortly after its release in November 2010 was awarded the German Record Critics’ Prize, Sami Ben Redjeb, with the support of the Goethe-Institut, returned to Angola in May 2011. On the agenda this time was not only a second CD with recordings from the “golden era”, but also the attempt to get some of the musicians from that time back on stage. And, indeed, on 20. May 2011, the living legends Boto Trindade (Os Bongos / guitar) and Teddy N’Singui (Inter-Palanca / guitar) together with Carlitos Timótio (Águias Reais / bass), Joãozinho Morgado (N’goleiros Do Ritmo / congas), Chico Montenegro (Os Jovens do Prenda / bongos) and Raúl Tolingas (Conjunto Kissanguela / Reco-Reco) performed in the Elinga Teatro of Luanda to a wildly enthusiastic audience. According to the euphoric reports in the Angolan press, the concert, organised by the production company Mano a Mano on an initiative of the Goethe-Institut, made musical history there. In October 2011 the Angolan super-group toured through six European cities.





We took this text from the latest edition of Goethe-Magazin. More exciting reports, background information and interviews on this topic can be found in „Luanda leuchtet – Angola im Aufbruch“.