Wednesday 30 June 2010

Stomping good fun: South African Accordion Jive (1972)

A boisterous stomping good time is being had by football lovers in South Africa. In Durban the beachfront promenade is one big festival of fun – which is also what South African jive music is mostly all about.

The City of Durban has done a great job all-round, including bringing in local musicians and artists to entertain the hordes of happy visitors. Pictured here is Matt of Matsuli fame having a chat to long-time musical stalwart Elliot Ngidi whose recordings date back to the shellac 78rpm days of the 1950s with songs such as Umatanazan and Busman. See reference in Chris Ballantine's collection here.

In celebration of fun, and in response to a request from our good musical friends in Barranquilla, Columbia, we offer you a 1972 Accordion Jive Compilation on the Go Go label.

Of the three artists featured, Lulu Masilela is now the most well known. Masilela wrote and played with Paul Simon on the Graceland album. He also headlined the Boyoyo Boys - their CD SuperJive Hits can be bought for R45 here.













RS here
MF here

7 comments:

  1. this is Great! just what I was looking for! thanks so much

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  2. Just discovered your site. This is truly wonderful stuff! Any chance of getting hold of volumes 1 and 2?! And would the second volume by any chance be the "Gumboots: Accordion Jive Hits, II" release that influenced Paul Simon?

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  3. Thanks for leaving a comment anonymous - I am certainly keeping my eyes peeled for more of this stuff - pretty hard to find though .. as for the Paul Simon influence connection, I am not sure - it is quite possible. Cheers. Chris

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  4. Thank you kindly for the swift response! I must also just mention that
    my favourite find here so far is without a doubt the album Sea Water
    by Alfred Ndima! These non-vocal tracks really allow you to pick up on
    the wonderful playing styles of each instrument…

    In response to my initial query, after a little more investigation it
    seems that the “impossible to find” compilation in question was
    possibly released by Gallo. Though other sources say it was a bootleg
    or mixtape, so probably not an official release and not from the same
    series as Greatest Accordion Hits Vol. 3.

    Sift through and one finds an interesting post by the last commenter
    at the bottom of this article (only 260 copies released on cassette!):

    http://stereogum.com/9106/david_byrne_does_paul_simon_the_worlds_biggest_pri/video/

    Anyway, I'll be looking out for similar albums in future! Thanks again!

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  5. Just a heads up for 'anonymous' - another album of accordeon jive soon to hit electric jive

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  6. sto54
    Hi there! I wonder if someone have album Spartacus R ‎– Watching You Grow 1976 to download it?
    THNX in advance

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