Mbira player Hope Masike on Friday launched her 3rd album titled ‘The Exorcism of a Spinster at Reps Theatre in Harare.
Masike journeyed with her fans across her three albums as well as touching tributes to departed arts icons like the well-known Mbira princess Chiwoniso Maraire and Oliver Mtukudzi.
Public relations practitioner, Mr Ray Mawerera was the director of ceremony and he provided a smooth bridge between segments with his genial skills doing what he knows best.
Guest artistes who graced the launch include the well-known storyteller Ignatius Mabasa, who left the crowd in stitches because of his performance, jazz pianist Filbert Marowa, who even joined Masike on stage for a jazzy song, the upcoming poet Fadzai Katanda as well as the dancer Peter Lenso, who wowed the crowd with his dancing skills.
Prior to this launch, Masike had 2 albums entittled Love, Mbira and Chocolate released in 2012, and a self-titled album Hope released in 2009. The youthful band lived up to their first appearance on a grand stage while the backing vocalists, a first for Masike, justified this evolution within her band.
Masike portrays herself as a guardian of Zimbabwean arts, as she smoothly demonstrated some of the local traditional dances such as chinyambera, jerusarema among others all intermixed with contemporary movements. Quite a number of fellow artistes came out in support.
Jazz musician Rute Mbangwa, human rights activist and musician Miss Nyaradzo ‘Nyari’ Mashayamombe, her co-producer and musician Mono Mukundi, radio personality Itai Takaendesa, the songbird Tariro neGitare, as well as the creative author Shimmer Chinodya also graced the event alongside a number of notables. An appreciative audience sang along to most of the songs.
The songs on this new album include Gomba, Idenga, Kune Mumwe, Ndoitasei, Wateme Tsanga, Dreams of Dande, Zunde, Yenzera, The Exorcism of a Spinster, Tonanaira, Mbira Yangu and Nditumei – The Calling.
Her publicist Nyasha Themba Dhliwayo in an interview with another source said that Masike’s music is an inspiration from her personal life and that of other women.
Dhliwayo said that, “the album is about different stories of a typical African woman, from her dreams for the motherland, Africa; her battles and victories; her love life, to the societal expectations placed on her,”
“She is the ray of hope for her music genre creating awareness and building appreciations of traditional Shona instruments like the ancestral Nhare and Nyunga Nyunga Mbira (yevadzimu), which in the past were believed to be associated with evil spirits and traditional rituals.”
In an interview with Zimbo Jam ahead of the launch of the album, Masike told Zimbabweans that the album is different from the previous work and that she had shuffled some of the band members among others, everything was new.
By Staff Writer
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