Preserving Matepe music
in the 21st century

Nothing in the world sounds like matepe. Anyone who has ever heard this sound live will never forget it. Experiencing how Sekuru Chawasaria suspends the flow of time in his living room, or sitting between the Zonke Family maestros on their veranda have been transformative moments for me. That “bleating” sound of the middle range…

It took much longer than planned. After the already delayed completion of the Matepe Clinic videos, we had to wait until Mangoma came to Germany again. But in March, the time had finally come. I sent him the USB sticks with all matepe.org videos, plus a tablet for Sekuru to have a tangible result of…

When recording Sekuru Chawasarira’s album, we simulated the interaction of two matepe players by Sekuru playing two different matepe. He was already familiar with the overdubbing process, and to playing on top of himself on headphones, from our Combining Parts tutorials. Useza by Chaka Chawasarira He very much disliked switching between instruments though, as it…

Last week Nyege Nyege Tapes announced Chaka Chawasarira’s album. I was so looking forward to this day! At one point during our activities in 2023, it occurred to us that we were documenting all the parts, but not the whole, and while we were trying our best to enable anyone to build and learn the…

In this post, I’d like to share the equipment we used to capture video and audio for our documentary, in the hope that it might be helpful for similar projects. My main requirements were: Video Choosing a suitable camera proved surprisingly difficult. Many affordable camcorders or DSLRs still have proprietary battery packs (that also cannot…

This post is to wrap up our fundraising campaign for James Kamwaza’s Matepe in School initiative. We raised 625€ of our 800€ goal (about 78%). After deducting the fees, I received 603,60€ from GoFundMe and sent $600 to James via Mukuru in mid-December (already sent $20 before). Since then, James built three heras for the…

When it comes to mbira, few things have made me as happy recently as James Kamwaza‘s initiative to give hera (matepe) lessons to the children at his nearest school in Nyanhewe/Rushinga. With the exception of Mangoma’s own children, this is probably the only place in Zim+Moz where the matepe is taught to the next generation.…

A guest post by Ian Garrett. Having become an amateur mbira enthusiast over the past few years, I noticed that mbila deza, South Africa’s only surviving indigenous mbira (played by Venda and Lemba people) seems to be little known outside the Vhembe region of Limpopo province. In 2023, I assisted Stefan Franke to create a…