Nostalgia of a Groovy Musical Tradition

By Amos Ngaira

NAIROBI, KENYA — To the critics of the Moi regime, the sort of
music that made Boniface Mganga, who died in a road accident last
week, was sycophancy in its rawest form.

Quick on praise and short on criticism for the regime’s
corruption and tribalism, the genre was bound to attract criticism
— even contempt — from non-Moi apologists.

At a time when Chief Justice Willy Mutunga, historian Maina wa
Kinyati, sociologist Katama Mkangi, Raila Odinga, Gitobu Imanyara
and a host of other Second Liberation figures were being hauled
into detention, Mganga, Darius Mbela, Thomas Wasonga, Prof
Washington Omondi and Prof George Zenoga Zake were composing songs
that would form an epoch in Kenya’s choral gospel music of the
political praise genre.

Many of the outstanding Moi-era musicians were invariably
promoted to high public offices or rewarded heavily in other ways,
inviting questions about the motivation behind their lyrics that
would praise the country and its president while lampooning his
political competitors.

But whichever way one looks at it, the creativity of the choral
pieces cannot be rubbished, their content notwithstanding.

A product of the iconic St Stephen’s Church Choir that was led
by Darius Mbela, Mganga would, in 1979, form a galaxy of choirs
that included members of St Stephen’s.

It was called Muungano National Choir, and its rendition of
Missa Luba, a version of the Latin mass based on traditional
Congolese songs by Father Guido Hazen, a Belgian, catapulted it to
international fame.