Stewart Sukuma

Mozambique was granted independence from Portugal in 1975. "It was only six months before independence that one fully understood what was going on and wanted to be part of it", says Sukuma today. It was the period subsequent to the 25th of April 1974, the Portuguese Carnation Revolution, that drew a whole generation into a whirl of new events and changes - in Portugal, in England and particularly in the African colonies, where a struggle for national and cultural independence had been going on for decades. "After independence, there was a cultural revolution and I used to dance for the bands that mushroomed. But I didn't want to be a dancer..." When the death of his oldest sister, who had left two children and a house in Maputo behind her, drove him to the capital of Mozambique, in 1977, he learned how to play percussion, the guitar and keyboard and started singing in a band in 1982.

In 1983 he recorded his first production for Radio Mozambique. At the blink of an eye he won the "Ngoma" prize as best up-and-coming musician, and within a short space of time became Mozambique's most popular musician. His productions have been played on radio, recorded on tapes and then distributed for sale by the radio stations. In a country shattered by civil war, the production of long-play records or CDs was simply not feasible. The attempt to secure a contract in Lisbon, where most musicians from former colonies were still doing their production work, was sadly in vain.

In 1995 Stewart, who meanwhile had become the most highly conferred musician in his country and celebrated as the "Star of the People", went with a demo-tape to neighboring South Africa. To take this step was somewhat unusual and a few years previously would have been totally unthinkable, because the Apartheid regime was still being embargoed and South Africa still diligently sought to further fan the flames of the Mozambiquean civil war after the end of the Cold War conflict. For the masses of destitute immigrant workers, who were illegally trying to eke out an existence, the passage into the "Land of the Rand" represented both humiliation and a last hope of survival. The new state of affairs after the peace agreement in Mozambique and the accession to power by the black majority in South Africa opened up new cultural perspectives. With an international team of professionals in a Johannesburg recording studio, Afrikiti was recorded - after more than 15 years of a music career, Stewart released his first album. Stewart Sukuma (a word that in Zulu more or less means "Rise Up" and "Push" in Swahili) was enthusiastically celebrated as the new star African music and in Mozambique won once again the Ngoma prize. Although only a small minority of people could even afford to buy his CD, the release of Afrikiti in his own country was nevertheless treated in the same manner as state occasion: The president, Joaquim Chiziano attended along with other prominent figures from around the country and the international music press.

The "Star of the People" has become the country's cultural mascot and a symbol of postwar reconstruction, which he is actively engaged in: A proportion of the proceeds from his CD goes to an environmental organization and he himself is actively involved in AIDS-Relief programs. As producer and promoter Sukuma supports young musicians in his country and thus personifies a new generation in Mozambiquean music. Ghorwane and Eyuphuro, the few internationally esteemed groups in his country, and the Marrabenta Stars, with whom Sukuma has toured around the world - among others at the "Beat Apartheid!" festival in Berlin-, and on whose first album he appears as a percussionist, are the regional forsterers of genuine Mozambiquean music.

Sukuma has also appeared on stage with Mark Knopfler, Youssou N'dour, Miriam Makeba and Harry Belafonte. Even if some purist critics in Mozambique have gone a bit too far, Afrikiti did, however, represent a very visible break-away from the light entertainment style of Marrabenta, or from that of the Soukous, which is prevalent in the whole of southern Africa.