Johnny Clegg—symbol of future multi-racial South Africa

Press, 27 January 1988, Page 32

Johnny Clegg —symbol of future multi-racial South Africa

By

BRENDON BURNS

An extraordinary man, who is perhaps the most visible symbol of a future, multi-racial South Africa, takes to the stage at the Neon Picnic music festival near Auckland on Friday evening. Johnny Clegg is white, but his music is derived from that of the migrant Zulu labourers who dig the gold and till the fields of South Africa.

Clegg became fascinated with such music—street music—as a teenager growing up in Johannesburg. It was street music because it was being played there by the gardeners, drivers, cooks and cleaners of white South African families.

The tiny rooms provided for the migrant workers do not allow for socialising which, instead, takes place on the streets. Johnny Clegg, who was born in England and then lived in Rhodesia, was amazed at Johannesburg. “The city was full of music. But nobody heard it because nobody saw it. I didn’t know what to do with myself because there were so many street musicians just walking down the street past the flat where I lived. I’d rush out with a tape recorder and talk to them as best I could,” Clegg said.

He began documenting the music, which involved an Afri-

canisation of the guitar to produce a unique, rhythmic quality. Then he met Sipho McHunu, a migrant Zulu worker, who also taught Clegg the mythologies, history and symbolism of the Zulu culture. '

Clegg went on to do a degree at university on the culture, while he and Sipho began playing together. “We couldn’t play in public. We could only play at private venues,” Clegg says. “We were not politically motivated in any way to do what we were doing. We loved the music, we just wanted to play,” he said.

A white man and a black man playing together, however, was in itself a political statement, and the pair faced racial abuse, threats of violence and police harassment.

Apartheid’s aim is not simply to keep the races physically, but also culturally separate. “The state radio wouldn’t play our music because they said we were mixing the languages, and according to apartheid, the Zulu programme only speaks in Zulu, and the English programme only speaks in English,” Clegg said. From the mid-19705, the musical style was evolving from mostly Zulu melodies and lyrics to include English. There was also a change from a folk-music style to a more contemporary

Western sound. This resulted in the formation of Juluka, a Zulu word meaning “sweat.”

Johnny and Sipho were upfront, with a similar mix of black and white musicians making up the rest of the band. Juluka released seven albums in South Africa and toured widely. From 1980, as apartheid’s rules on segregation eased, Juluka was able to play to mixed audiences.

“We set out to play music. We found that when we got on stage we were seen as a symbol of a non-racial future,” Clegg said. He was fuelling the symbolism with his command of Zulu culture, proving this was not inherent, as apartheid maintained, but could be learnt.

He danced the high-kicking Zulu warrior-style dances and had the black members of the audience chuckling at his jokes, delivered in fluent Zulu.

For whites, he was presenting a culture they had been told from birth was inferior, overlaying it with Western influences. It was a ’ uniquely South African sound, and was best captured by the successful “Scatterlings of Africa” album. In 1985, Sipho opted to become a cattle farmer although Juluka still records together. Clegg has formed a new band, Savuka, meaning “We have

He said there was an awakening of the forces for change within South Africa.

“We believe we are part of that awakening,” Clegg said.

While blacks and whites can now dance and even swim together, apartheid has not disappeared. “Political and economic apartheid is still very much intact,” Clegg said. Savuka has a more political message than Jaluka. Its first album, “Third World Child,” includes “Asimbonanga,” meaning “We have not seen him.” It is a tribute to Nelson Mandela and others, such as Steve Biko, who have suffered the injustices of apartheid. The song was banned in South Africa, but became an underground hit. • “I am a political person,” said Clegg. “I relate to South Africa in a very political way.”

But he will not turn his music into propaganda. It has to stand on its own, not merely be a vehicle for meaningful content.

“I’ve never related to music in that way. It’s not a tool to conscientise people,” Clegg said.

Whether those who see Johnny Clegg and Savuka at the Neon Picnic are looking for message or music, either way, they are in for a unique vision of what multiculturalisrri- might mean for South Africa.