Karonga\u2013based group Lusubilo Band showed on Saturday that their being voted the 2014 the best band in the Music Malawi (Muma) Awards spearheaded by MediaCorp and Trocadero Consulting in partnership with Musicians Union of Malawi (Mum) was not at all a fluke.<\/p>\n
Their performance at Mibawa Caf\u00e9 in Blantyre was classic and if it were during a sports tournament, they simply could have grabbed the gold medal.<\/p>\n
They came all the way from their base in Karonga \u2013 but they did not come as tourists, they came as musicians and at the end of it all they conquered. No wonder they attracted interest from organisers of the Sunbird Sand Music Festival, who have promised to have them on board during their festival end October.<\/p>\n
Entertainers Promotions led by Jai Banda has also automatically put them on the line-up of their Sound and Light Concert to be held at Sunbird Livingstonia in Salima from September 5 to September 6.<\/p>\n
The audience during their performance, which was part of their countrywide tour which started with a free show in Karonga then Mzuzu before dating Blantyre on Saturday, was disappointing.<\/p>\n
But this could not discourage Lusubilo Band from offering the best on an afternoon where the commercial city of Blantyre also hosted a Carlsberg Cup semi-final soccer match between Bullets FC and Silver Strikers.<\/p>\n
The group was simply faultless on the day save for the space in the Mibawa Caf\u00e9 which restricted their dancing.<\/p>\n
Featuring a brass section, they started their act on the afternoon with a Jazz session before taking a break and then came back killing it off with an afro pop session.<\/p>\n
Their act was lively throughout; it had all what one needs in a live performance: the energy, the dancing, the singing and the co-ordination showing they took time in rehearsing.<\/p>\n
Their last year\u2019s performance in South Korea seems to have also perfected them as they went on to dish out several songs, some of which were in Ngonde but with music they communicated.<\/p>\n
Some of the renditions they dished out included \u2018Africa Inuka,\u2019 which means Africa wake up, \u2018Kachitsa,\u2019 a song lifted from one of the popular folktales, \u2018Kalonga,\u2019 \u2018Asimenye Yo Kyala,\u2019 which means God knows, \u2018Mwana Mpina,\u2019 (An orphan), and \u2018Lupakisho.\u2019<\/p>\n
Through their songs they showed some of the traditional dances popular in the Northern region with Minoghe from Karonga standing out.<\/p>\n
The group last performed in Blantyre two years ago at the then Arts Caf\u00e9 where they also stole the show.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are excited to perform in Blantyre once again. We are just disappointed that not many people came but we hear there were lots of events but also people who normally visit this venue like night shows. We want through our performances to show our culture but also show how music is done,\u201d said Lusubilo\u2019s leader Joseph Nyirenda.<\/p>\n
The group, which also won the Chibuku Road to Fame competition, is made up of students from the Lusubilo Music Centre spearheaded by Professor Agnes Kim.<\/p>\n
Lusubilo Band missed the services of one of its key vocalists Rebecca Mwalwenje, who left for Norway on an exchange programme courtesy of Music Crossroads Malawi, but her absence was not felt as the other members, including Judith Mhango and Maggie Kang\u2019oma stood in perfectly.<\/p>\n
Professor Kim was impressed with the group\u2019s performance on the day, saying they have improved tremendously and she said her aim is to help lift the music industry in the country adding that she has been bringing different music experts to the centre to train the youths.<\/p>\n
The group which has just released a DVD of their Korean tour titled Sing for Hope <\/em>was expected to hold its last performance yesterday at Lilongwe Golf Club.<\/p>\n Towards the end former broadcaster Gift Mabeya Mbeya had to request Tiwonge Hango, who is Lusubilo Band\u2019s producer and teacher to perform and he performed \u2018Mama Africa,\u2019 and \u2018Mkazi Wakumudzi.\u2019<\/p>\n Singer and guitarist Davis Njobvu, who performed with Edgar ndi Davis Band as curtain-raisers, could not hide his excitement with the group\u2019s performance.<\/p>\n \u201cI have never watched this group perform, this was my first time but frankly speaking I am impressed. This group needs to be supported because they are good and if we are to stand out there, then we need to promote such kind of music,\u201d said Davis.<\/p>\n Edgar ndi Davis Band performed for close to 30 minutes and stepped onto the stage soon after Lusubilo had finished their jazz set and some of the songs they dished out included \u2018Energy Saver.\u2019<\/p>\n Old-timer Giddes Chalamanda, who performs with Edgar ndi Davis Band also, had his share offering his popular song \u2018Che Meli.\u2019<\/p>\n The 85-year old musician continues to sing and he did it to perfection attracting cheers from the audience and he could not skip showing people his dance moves.<\/p>\n However, the legendary musician is slowly losing his voice and this was noticed in the song as he could not manage to play the high notes which he has always.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Karonga\u2013based group Lusubilo Band showed on Saturday that their being voted the 2014 the best band in the Music Malawi (Muma) Awards spearheaded by MediaCorp and Trocadero Consulting in partnership with Musicians Union of Malawi (Mum) was not at all a fluke. Their performance at Mibawa Caf\u00e9 in Blantyre was classic and if it were […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":7585,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7584","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7584"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7584\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7586,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7584\/revisions\/7586"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}