'Music Is Our Weapon' premieres in Kigali

When I heard that Music Is Our Weapon, a music documentary was screening in Kigali Friday night I was initially unmoved. Unmoved because I was sure I had already watched a documentary in that name. In June last year, there was a screening of Music Is The Weapon, a documentary film about the legendary Nigerian musician Fela Anikulapo Kuti, who is credited with creating the Afrobeat musical genre. What was screened at the Impact Hub in Kiyovu Friday night was as similar in title as they get; Music Is Our Weapon. The similarity also extends in theme. The documentary chronicles the lives of one of the best Afro Fusion bands on the contemporary Kenyan music scene, the Sarabi Band. It opens with a lively montage of the band’s members performing at different venues across the world, from Sauti za Busara in Tanzania to the Roskilde Festival in Denmark. The band’s music and lyrical style is influenced by the everyday happenings and injustices around band members in the impoverished community. Their music blends influences of traditional Kenyan sounds, Benga, and some western influences. In the documentary, the band’s music, though sung predominantly in Swahili, is easy to follow as it features an abundance of live performance clips with English subtitles. It tries to delve into the hardships and stumbling blocks that group members have to wade through for their dreams to see the light of day. There are low and heart wrecking moments for the band, like the time when one band member decided to leave and fly abroad in search of greener pastures. Coming from similar impoverished backgrounds, band members are heartbroken by the development, yet still understand that, in the circumstances, a man “has to do what he has to do”. In several interviews, band members talk about their individual journeys of heartbreak growing in poverty and trying to pursue musical dreams. They talk about eventually breaking the chains to the limelight, what influences their musical style, about the sanctity of parenthood, about giving back to the community … The documentary also features appearances from among others social and music activists, other musicians, to diplomats and ordinary Kenyans who connect with the band’s musical and social ideology. The group was invited to take part in the 2006 World Urban Forum in Vancouver in 2006, a year after the band’s formation. As part of this tour, the band published a book, Image-In the MDGs. The book argued a compelling case for public discussion on development strategies and policies and understanding the global dimension within which their voices can be heard. It’s the kind of movie screening you’d have hoped to attract a cross section of the actors in the local music scene, but just like the Fela Kuti documentary in June last year, attendance was fickle, with the crowd made up largely of the expat/backpacker crowd. Sarabi Band is big on Kenyan soil. Just as big as the Sauti Sol band was in Kenya, even before the region could embrace them. On the European and American music festival scene, however, their sounds and rhythms have been gaining wider acceptance since 2005 when the band came together. A 2007 feature in Drum Magazine described the band as “the next force in Kenyan music”, while earlier in August 2013, Buzz Magazine had described the band as “the new face of Afro-Fusion in Kenya”. The word “Sarabi” is in Swahili, and could mean mirage, vision, creation, or imagination. It is made up of eight young men and one young lady who all were born and raised from the Eastlands slums in Nairobi. All group members embarked on their turbulent musical journeys at a tender age, with some as young as ten years of age at the time. The members are; Nelson Mandela (lead vocalist), Isabella Were (vocals), Harun Waceke (bass and vocals), Adam Mwadama (acoustic guitar and vocals), Peter Mbau (acoustic guitar and vocals), Bernard Oduor (drums and vocals), Anthony Kimangu (percussions and vocals), and John Maluni (keyboard). Music Is Our Weapon is basically a profile of these very talented eight young men and one young woman. Directed and produced by Nigerian photographer and film producer Taye Balogun, the documentary offers the viewer background profiles of each member, how they ended up doing music, and how the band eventually came to be. The band’s existence owes a lot to a youth mentorship program at the Mathare Youth Sports Association, which is some kind of theater of dreams for the local socially disadvantaged youths. A one George Nderitu, a youth trainer at the center features prominently in the documentary, as indeed he does in Sarabi Band’s formation and the subsequent fortunes of band members. Nderitu took the young band members under his wing, mentored them, opened them to a world of possibilities and opportunities, and eventually pulled the strings that saw the formation of Sarabi Band from two separate musical outfits, Sauti Za Kwetu, and Wembe Kali. Their story begins in the harsh ghettos of Eastlands in Nairobi, where the Haba na Haba Center is located. Formed by Sarabi Band manager George Nderitu, the center offers hope to the slum’s youths, who are either out of school, or cannot pursue their artistic dreams from the local elementary schools they attend. The center provides free practical performing arts classes for children and youth as well some leadership training. Kids interested in music are enrolled in the music program and organized into different bands. editorial@newtimes.co.rw

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'Music Is Our Weapon' premieres in Kigali