Joseph Shabalala

Earlier, we were discussing how recording Graceland led Simon to two of his most enduring personal relationships, one of them being Begiti Kamalo.

The other was Joseph Shabalala, who was the founder and musical director of Ladysmith Black Mambazo, the South African choral group who would eventually become integral to the sound of Graceland.

And Simon had known about Ladysmith Black Mambazo even before his first trip to South Africa, but he was reluctant to meet Joseph and wouldn't do so until his second trip.

Why was that the case, and could you tell us about their meeting?

You know, him and Garfunkel had come up in love with the Everly Brothers, in love with Doo-Wop, you know.

and the doo-wop groups of the 1950s, you know, there was a vocal precision or, you know, harmony precision singing, you know, which really comes out of the church, black church, you know, gospel quartets and the like.

So that whole... uh background uh you know sets him in motion to to uh hear this incredible 10-piece vocal choir that has seven bass singers not tenor not alto bass singers and then one alto and two tenors and it's intimidating as hell you know and paul talks about that and so that first trip to africa i think was as much about music building as it was confidence building you know and that once this there was a success and that he knew he was on the right path he said okay now i'm going to reach for the prize i'm going to reach out to joseph shabalala and he takes a trip just to meet joseph to South Africa.

This is after the recording session.

He got to be the tour manager for Ladysmith Black Mambasso, and they came to prominence in this album.

Yeah, there were great moments we didn't include in this interview, but I think one of my favorite moments was I just, I fangirled out on Ashley Kahn a little bit, and I was like, so you knew the great Joseph Shabalala, and tell me about him.

And he whipped out a picture of the two of them at some wedding from the 80s, and I just was like, oh! I don't know how I feel about divine intervention, but I believe Joseph was sent from somewhere.

Wow.

Ivor Gurney was born in 1890.

He was an English poet and composer who wrote a lot about his experiences while serving on the front lines of World War I. Joseph Shabalala was born in 1940, founder and music director of the South African choral group Ladysmith Black Mambazo, who introduced the sounds of South Africa to the global stage.

Alfonso Herrera was born in 1983.

He earned international pop culture fame as a singer in the Mexican Latin pop group RBD, which actually had its start on the hit telenovela Rebelde.

They also shared the stage with her during performances.

To remember that extraordinary musical connection, I spoke with Thami Shabalala, a longtime member of Ladysmith Black Mambazo and the son of its founder and musical director, Joseph Shabalala.

I asked him about meeting Dolly Parton and the memories that remain with him and the group today.

We first met with Dolly Parton back in 1997 in Los Angeles.

Mm

... where at that time, music from the continent was not very popular in that space?

It was always a dream of our founder, Dr. Joseph Shabalala, to take this music, uh, to the world.

So we, we got the chance to work with Paul Simon, as Paul Simon was the one who introduced Ladysmith Black Mambazo to the world.

And if, if you look at, probably the most revealing article to me is the one that David Fricke wrote.

About where he interviewed Paul, but he also interviewed all the members of the, uh, primary members of the performing group, Joseph Shabalala from Ladysmith-

Mm-hmm

...

That's the only thing he could find, but I'm guessing they were unavailable 'cause they were on tour or recording or something like that.

And Paul and the band's lead, uh, Joseph Shabalala, collabora- I think he's, I think he passed.

I think we don't, we no longer have Joseph Shabalala with us anymore.

But they collaborated on writing a few songs together, kind of remotely from each other, but they wrote a few songs for this album.

And interesting history, the band, they had written the s- they had written the song.

But it turns out they had been longtime friends, and Paul asked Linda to collaborate with him on a song, which is why when you listen to the song, uh, there's a line, "Take this child, Lord, from Tucson, Arizona," which is the city that Linda was born and raised in.

Um, and interestingly, Linda does not get any songwriting credit, only vocals credit.

And I know that, uh, the, the thing that stands out to me about this song as well, this song actually invokes the, uh, Joseph Shabalala's, uh, name.

Give me what I should write about for the second verse of this tune called Under African Skies.

Because the first tune is going to be about Joseph Shabalala.

But he felt very strongly about Linda being pilloried for her visit to South, more so than any other artist that went to Sun City.

And she, in this terrible cover story in Rolling Stone that just took her apart for her willful innocence, or alleged willful innocence, where she's saying, I want to see this shit for myself.