A benefit for Togo, headlined with transplanted local boy, Yawo Attivor, and the irrepressible, straight-from-Togo Jimi Hope drummed up thousands of sorely needed dollars for this West African country last Saturday evening, April 30th.
Silhouetted on stage against a slate gray backdrop, Sipokazi Luzipo' clear alto voice calls out into blackness. A taut hide stretched over a jembe provides drumming surface to accompany Luzipo as she chants and narrates Jikele Emaweni in Xhosa. Soon 24 other singers of Soweto Gospel Choir climb the stairs of the Ted Mann Concert Hall, at the University of Minnesota, transporting the audience into another world of color, movement and sound unlike the usual fare found under the red, white, and blue stars and stripes of the United States.
Tanzania’s Taarab and Bongo Flava star, Ray C, was in the Twin Cities on Thanksgiving Day eve and her sex appeal overpowered the men in the room.
One might expect a bigger, louder, brassier woman to be the one who breaks down gender barriers in Mali, West Africa.