The “divide Identity Of Manu Dibango
Manu DiBango is an individual many Westerners are familiar with. He was the first African musician ever to record a top-40s hit and still remains a very popular musician, playing to full houses wherever he performs. A master of his instrument, the saxophone, DiBango is one of the earliest “world music artistes” we have in the world.
Born in Cameroon in 1933, he left home for France in pursuit of his studies in 1948. In Europe, he began picking up instruments such as the piano and the saxophone, and was exposed to Western musical styles such as jazz, blues and rhythm. Friends and other musicians he played with also introduced him to American musicians such as Tino Rossi, Duke Ellington, Miles Davis and Johnny Hodges, extending his knowledge of Western music beyond the already-familiar Louis Armstrong and Glenn Miller. It was here in Europe that he became a serious musician with sights on becoming famous.
DiBango became famous in the West in 1972, before the terms “world music” and “world musician” were coined up (pg 2. Taylor). In fact, the market mechanisms of 1972 probably did not know how to respond to DiBango’s fame and his hit Soul Makossa. In that case, one must be careful when looking at DiBango’s relation with the market; we cannot look and analyse the workings of the market in same ways we do now.
To many critics, DiBango is a typical world musician, one who means more to the commercialised Western worlds of Europe and America than to his native Africa. In fact, these critics argue that the most “African” thing about DiBango is his name – his music is totally alien to the continent. These detractors claim that DiBango has “sold-out” to the market and is merely catering to the “world music” stereotype. Others however, argue that DiBango has been creating his own brand of music and that he has been successful simply because of his virtuosity on his instrument. Yet others argue that...
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