Close window

Close window

Year END Appeal advertisement
Get our weekly e-Newsletter!
Recent Reviews
Syran MbenzaEnsemble Rumba Kongo Immortal Franco Riverboat Records, 2009
Listen to sample: "Tour a Tour"
Buy from Amazon.com

It is hard to imagine what Luambo Makiadi, a.k.a. Franco, might have gotten up to these past 20 years had he not died at 51, most likely from the disease he had famously warned his listeners about in song: AIDS. Two decades after that grim October, there’s no mistaking the mark Franco left on Congolese music, and this tribute CD by some of the genre’s most distinguished living practitioners certainly does the “Grand Master” proud.

Guitarist Syran Mbenza was only six-years-old when Franco burst onto the Kinshasa scene in 1956, so Mbenzq grew up immersed in the melodious clawing of Franco’s signature, thumb-and-finger guitar style and the many hues of the TPOK Jazz sound over the band’s 33-year run. Mbenza made his own mark with The Four Stars (Quatre Etoiles) alongside an OK Jazz alumnus, singer Wuta Mayi. These two musicians stuck together when Mbenza went acoustic in the band Kekele starting in 2000, and they’re at it again on the current project, which draws on ideas from their earlier groups, but focuses on evoking the spirit and sound of “Immortal Franco.”

The set of 12 songs begins and ends with Mbenza compositions. The opener, “Heritage Ya Luambo,” is a tribute rendered as acoustic-guitar rumba, à la Kekele—heartfelt but a little formal with its listing of countries where Franco played and was loved. The end piece, “Tour a Tour (Round and Round)” is a delightfully brisk workout in the manner of OK Jazz in its prime, with punchy horns, mingling electric guitars, and harmonized vocals by a rich, male chorus. Between those bookends, we get a connoisseur’s selection from Franco’s body of some 1200 songs. There’s the much covered “Infidelité Mado,” with its unforgettable vocal refrain and guitar riffs, and also a medley of Franco rumba numbers, “Rumba Odemba.”

Other choices are less familiar. “Liwa ya Franco (The Death of Franco)” is a brooding lament that Franco wrote for a childhood friend who passed away during the 1960s. Soon afterwards, Miriam Makeba recorded it as “Liwa Wechi.” This version is reworked and sung gorgeously by Paris-based, soukous stalwart Ballou Kantam now lamenting the passing of Franco himself. Another standout, “Liyanzi Ekoti Ngai Na Motema (Mouzi),” is a cogent condensation of a 14-minute Ntesa Dalienst composition. From the half-talking intro section, we ramp up into brassy, mid-tempo rumba not long past the one-minute mark. Elba Kuluma’s robust, chalky tenor works its way through a thicket of pleasing arranging twists. At 3:30 we’re into “seben” mode OK Jazz style, with elegant guitar riffs from Syran and meaty brass passages, dignified animation by a male chorus.

Elegance and dignity are watchwords here, and that makes a contrast with the every more gritty Congo sounds of today. Wuta Mayi and Elba Kuluma share most of the vocals on the session, and Mbenza rules on guitar, though Bopol Manisuamina appears on “Rumba Odemba,” and Fofo de Collegien solos on the lush and beautiful “Salima.”


Contributed by Banning Eyre for www.afropop.org