In many ways, his musical career has been shaped by the history of his home, Angola. For much of the past three decades, the country has faced the ravages of war. First, a bloody war of independence against the Portuguese, followed by a long civil war, where Angola was essentially a pawn in the Cold War, with the United States and South Africa on one side, Cuba and the Soviet Union on the other. The country that was once one of Africa's richest, full of natural resources today is the one with the greatest number of landmines.

Until independence, the Portuguese colonial government didn't support native languages or musical forms - let alone political songs or dreams of independence. In the period following independence in 1974, a number of artists were killed for participating in what the government described as "anti-state activities." So Bonga headed off to the Netherlands where he recorded the classic "Angola 72," while Waldemar Bastos travelled throughout the former Soviet bloc (Poland, Czechoslovakia, Poland, the former Soviet Union, and Cuba) before moving to Brazil. In a sense, it was a natural choice, as Brazil's national music, the Samba, is based on the Angolan semba rhythm. For centuries the Portuguese brought millions Angolan slaves to Brazil, and to this day, their music is linked.

For Bastos, the 1980s in Brazil was in many ways a new beginning for his musical career. "My first record "Estamos Juntos" (We're Together) was a beautiful trans-Atlantic collaboration. It featured many of Brazil's top stars, including Martinho Da Vila, Chico Buarque, and João do Vale." Bastos explained that the experience was at first "a bit intimidating," with the added complication that "I never learned to read music, I played by ear, and still do to this day."

While Bastos was in Brazil, the civil war in Angola raged on. "Although both sides in the war have tried to claim my music as their own," Bastos explains, "I have consistently refused to sell out politically or to be drawn into partisan politics for money. In my music I have just as consistently offered (in response to the fratricide in Angola) a simple message emphasizing the value of all life, the beauty and abundance of this world and the profound need for hope." It is a message that resonates through the various political factions and ethnic groups within Angola. "When I gave a free concert in 1990, more than 200,000 people crowded into Kinaxixe Square in the capital of Luanda. It is said that only my songs have the power to make both President dos Santos and UNITAS leader Jonas Savimbi dance together."

In the 1990s, Bastos returned to Europe, eventually settling in Lisbon, Portugal. In many ways, Bastos considers it a "paradox" to be "the voice of Angola" while living in Portugal. The country that did so much to damage African culture is now a center of African music.

Bastos explains that when growing up in Angola, he was raised speaking Portuguese "since learning indigenous languages was prohibited by the colonial authorities. I learned Kimbundu and Ovimbundo through traveling with my parents, both nurses, who were treating Angolan victims of tuberculosis, leprosy and other diseases." Today, Lisbon is a place where you can hear indigenous languages from Mozambique, Angola, Guinea-Bissau, Cape Verde, Angola, and São Tome (all former Portuguese colonies). In a way, the city is much like Paris, the musical center of the Francophone world. Lisbon, an arts center for the Lusophone world is home to numerous record labels dedicated to African music. So, while most executives at American record labels were running back and forth to Paris, Luaka Bop's Yale Evelev was looking towards Lisbon. 1995's compilation "Telling Stories to the Sea" featured many of these African starts of the Lisbon scene, including Waldemar Bastos. This compilation was followed by Bastos' first full-length American release, "Pretaluz," on Luaka Bop label. The record, like much of Bastos' prior work, incorporates Angolan folk traditions, including the semba, along with Brazilian, Portuguese, and even a little Congolese rhythm thrown in. It is a combination of love songs, and tales of the Angolan tragedy. The moving "Morro do Kassava" (Mount Kassava) is a story about a hill in southern Angola. Bastos remembers, "It is a hill overlooking the city of Nova Lisboa (New Lisbon) where some of the most ferocious fighting took place during the civil war. Coming into the city, you used to be able to see the shimmering lights of the city from a distance of 20 kilometers. Now, all that remains of that beautiful sight is darkness. Like the weapons that destroyed the light of Nova Lisboa, everyday we are becoming more like machines. There is such a profound lack of love between people and, above all, that beauty that once existed in my country." Always an optimist, Bastos closes the song, "If it once existed (this beauty), I believe it must return."

Contributed by: Dan Rosenberg