BUJUMBURA, May 3rd (ABP) – Marahaba Festival, in partnership with American Corner, joined the rest of the world in celebrating International Jazz Music Day on Tuesday 30 April, which since 2020 has been celebrated on 30 April each year.
The celebration brought together artists from Burundi, Tanzania and the DRC, a check on the site by ABP has revealed.
Jazz music comes from the United States,” said Ms Linah Blanche, a Burundian artist, who pointed out that the Burundian population is not familiar with this music. For it to become known, traditional and modern music artists need to work together, she said.
Freed Mushaga, a Congolese jazz singer, expressed his passion for jazz. For him, jazz is a way of living together and sharing the region’s cultural diversity. Jazz, which is a cultural music deeply rooted in African culture, recalls the past of the black people.
For her part, Tanzanian artist Mrs Anett Ngongi, whose stage name is “Segito”, present at this celebration, considers Jazz to be an African mother music, the mother of all black and African music in particular. It recalls the sad period of slavery of the black people in the United States, she said, lamenting that this music is not well known by the public. To meet this challenge, she suggests that African artists should work together to make this music the mother of other African musical genres.