The lioness sleeps tonight: Miriam Makeba 1932-2008

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Miriam Makeba

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When last october she performed in Kampala, Uganda, somebody said it would have been her last performance: apparently, Miriam "Mama Afrika" Makeba was about to retire. And why not do that in Uganda where apparently at least a couple other great music acts such as Third World and UB40 chose to close their respective music careers?

Actually, it was not her last concert. But it was close.
Her last stage and audience were waiting for her in Italy, on November 9, 2008. Less than a month later than the Kampala gig.

Miriam Makeba was born in 1932, her father a Xhosa and her mother a Swazi - and a sangoma, the South African equivalent of a shaman.
Professionally active since the 1950s with the Manhattan Brothers and then the The Skylarks, she worked with Hugh Masekela - who later became her husband - and Harry Belafonte.

Her anti-apartheid activities - both related to her artistic career and not, since she even testified before the United Nations - brought her attention from audiences from Italy to USA, but at the same time costed her the South African passport and citizenship in the early 1960s. Yet many other countries offered her passport or honorary citizenship. She would have had to wait until Nelson Mandela's release and the 1990s to put foot in her homeland again.

She appeared in movies and documentaries and made several succesful recordings, earning a Grammy Award in 1966 for "An Evening with Belafonte/Makeba", and gaining a Grammy nomination in 2000 for her album "Homeland". She also appeared in Paul Simon's "Graceland" tour.

But one episode needs to be remembered: in 1960, she was the first artist of international fame to record "Mbube" ("lion") by Solomon Linda.

Linda Was a Zulu who had first recorded this song in 1939, without earning more than a small fee from the record label who exploited it. The song had sold 100.000 copies and after going out of South Africa it had generated two popular variations: "Wimoweh" by The Weavers and the international hit "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" by The Tokens.
The story of Linda - who died without even having a proper tomb, leaving his family in conditions of extreme povery while white musicians and publishers kept exploiting his work for decades - is symbol to what happened to Africa, in much more than just art or music.
In an exceptional article written in 2000 and titled "In the jungle", Rian Malan reconstructed the complicated history of "Mbube"; his piece appeared in Rolling Stone magazine and was reprinted in many places and in different laguages, thus generating new interest in the song and finally a lawsuit that did some justice about it after several decades. Malan did not forget Makeba's version in his incredibly documented piece, remembering she even sang her version in front of JFK for his birthday, just before a certain famous Marilyn Monroe performance.

And back to yesterday. Makeba was in Castel Volturno, near Salerno, Italy. Performing against racism and also in support of Roberto Saviano, young author threatened by Camorra, the mafia-like organization described in his book "Gomorrah", now translated in many languages and also just transposed into a movie.
Saviano is a symbol to many Italians, especially young ones. A symbol of hope and rebirth, just like Makeba - who survived many personal tragedies - is to South Africa and to many other african countries.

Makeba did her show, singing for half an hour and then collapsing. Her last audience and her last applause accompained her while she was rushed to the Pineta Grande clinic in Castel Volturno, where she died of a heart attack at 76. Her last concert was also her last battle for freedom.
A photo gallery from Italian newspaper La Repubblica shows some moments of her last concert and - sadly - the last moments of Makeba being helped and the ambulance taking her to a hospital.
 
If you accept the idea of another life after this, it comes not difficult imagining her singing heavenly hymns - with a distinctive African feel - together with Solomon Linda.