Jonas Gwangwa and culture as the struggle’s frontline

A cultural figurehead remains an enigma for most of his compatriots [View this email in your browser]( January 28, 2021 [Mail & Guardian]( [Mail & Guardian]( [Twitter]( [Facebook]( [Instagram]( [YouTube]( Hi there, Trombonist, composer and bandleader, Jonas Gwangwa spent several decades of his fruitful years on the run, plying his trade outside the country’s borders and music scene, while looking over his shoulder for signs of apartheid’s trenchcoats. The pain of exile and the anticlimax of returning home are conditions he has lived through and, therefore, thought about deeply. The rootlessness and the yearning for home, although shattering, were tempered by strong networks and communal support, which Gwangwa — exiled across three continents — eventually harnessed towards the establishment of Amandla, a unit that gave cultural expression to the ANC’s liberation efforts. In this week’s edition of the Mail & Guardian Friday, we try to get closer to the man: the father who survives a bombing, but has to contend with a family “strewn apart” by the hustle of asylum seeking; the son who, through the pain of separation, remains just that, childlike and endearing to his mother; and the comrade who, through a sharp sense of egalitarianism and diplomacy, marshalled the disparate voices spread across the ANC’s guerilla camps into an imposing cultural force. In an illuminating send-off that goes beyond platitudes and hyperbole, several writers and photographers flesh out the trombonist’s accomplishments and recall his human spirit. Gwen Ansell takes us deep into Gwangwa discography, unearthing his string of collaborations with countrymen Hugh Masekela, Miriam Makeba, Letta Mbulu, Caiphus Semenya and others, as well as shedding light on the hours upon hours of uncredited trombone Gwangwa lent to his contemporaries’ recordings. She takes us into the activities in Gaborone and Gwangwa’s inclusive mode of working that made the band Shakawe a powerful amalgam of Batswana and South African musicians. Lucas Ledwaba recounts how, as a young reporter, he bonded with the musician over SiNdebele saseNyakatho, a language Gwangwa spoke and sometimes recorded in, inadvertently contributing to its survival and recognition. Photographer Siphiwe Mhlambi, who has built an incredible body of work on South Africa’s jazz lineage, had the fortune of being Gwangwa’s neighbour. He recounts how, over hours on Gwangwa’s couch and through following him around to performances, he was given a front-row seat to jazz history and the complex lives of those who created it. He learns that the musician’s generosity on the stage sprung from a lived philosophy honed as a line of defence against the immense brutalities he witnessed. As Ansell says in her piece: although no more new music will come from the man, ours is to become familiar with what he left behind. Kwanele Sosibo, M&G Friday editor [Subscribe now]( Enjoy The Ampersand? Share it with your friends [Share]( [Share]( [Tweet]( [Tweet]( [Forward]( [Forward]( [Share]( [Share]( Copyright © 2021 Mail & Guardian Media LTD, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you opted in to receive communications from the Mail & Guardian either at our website or by taking out a print subscription. Our mailing address is: Mail & Guardian Media LTD 25 Owl St BraamfonteinJohannesburg, Gauteng 2001 South Africa [Add us to your address book]( Want to change how you receive these emails? You can [update your preferences or unsubscribe here.]( This email was sent to {EMAIL} [why did I get this?]( [unsubscribe from this list]( [update subscription preferences]( Mail & Guardian Media LTD · 25 Owl St · Braamfontein · Johannesburg, Gauteng 2001 · South Africa