The story of Miriam Makeba begins in South Africa. She was born on March 4, 1932 in the black township of Prospect. That is near Johannesburg. Her mother was a Swazi woman named Christina Makeba. She was a traiditional healer or a sangoma and a domestic worker. He father was a Xhosa human being. His name was Caswell Makeba and he was a teacher. He passed away when he was only 6 years old. Her mother gave her the name Zenzile. Later, she was 18 days old. At that time, her mother was arrested and sentenced for 6 months in prison for selling umqombothi. Umqombothi is a homemade beer brewed from malt and cornmeal. Since the family couldn’t afford the small fine required to avoid a jail term, her mother went to jail including her (as a young toddler). Makeba sang in the choir of the Kilnerton Training Institute in Pretoria as a child. That location was an all-black Methodist primary school. She attended the school for eight years. Her gift of singing was praised by people at the school. Makeba was baptized as a Protestant. She sang in church choirs in English, Xhosa, Sotho, and Zulu. Later, she said that she learned to sing in English before she could speak the language. Her family moved into Transvaal when Makeba was a child. She did domestic work after her father passed away. She also worked as a nanny. She said that she was a shy person during those years. Her mother worked for white families in Johannesburg and had to live away from her six children. Miriam Makeba lived for a while with her grandmother and a large number of cousins in Pretoria. She was influenced by her family’s musical tastes. Her mother in fact played many traditional instruments. Her older brother collected records like those of Duke Ellington and Ella Fitzgerald. He taught her about songs. Her father played the piano. Her family inspired her in her pursuit of musical expression. In 1949, Makeba married James Kubaby, who was a policeman in training. They had their only child named Bongi Makeba. That was in 1950. Later, Makeba was diagnosed with breast cancer. Her husband was said to have beaten her. He left her after a 2 year marriage. After one decade, she overcome cervical cancer via a hysterectomy (or the surgical removal of the uterus of a woman).
Miriam Makeba’s start of her professional musical careet started with the Cuban Brothers. They were a South African all-men close harmony group. She sang covers of many popular American songs with them. By the age of 21, she joined a jazz group called the Manhattan Brothers. This group sang a mixture of South African songs and pieces from popular African American groups. She was the only woman in the group. With the Manhattan Brothers, she recorded her first hit called “Laku Tshoni Ilanga.” That was in 1953 and it developed her a national reputation as a muscian. In 1956, Miriam Makeba joined a new all-women group called the Skylarks. This group sang a blend of jazz and traditional South African melodies. They were formed by Gallotone Records and the group was also known as the Sunbeams. While traveling abroad, she sang with both the Skylarks and the Manhattan Brothers. She sang alongside the Rhodesian-born (now Zimbabwe) musician Dorothy Masuka (with the Skylarks). She followed Dorothy’s music including the music from Dolly Rathebe. Several of the Skylarks' pieces from this period became popular; the music historian Rob Allingham later described the group as "real trendsetters, with harmonization that had never been heard before." Makeba received no royalties from her work with the Skylarks. She met Nelson Mandela in 1955 while she was performing with the Manhattan Brothers. Makeba said that Nelson said that she was “going to be someone.” In 1956, Gallotone Records released "Lovely Eyes", Makeba's first solo success; the Xhosa lyric about a man looking for his beloved in jails and hospitals was replaced with the unrelated and innocuous line "You tell such lovely lies with your two lovely eyes" in the English version. The record became the first South African record to chart on the United States Billboard Top 100. In 1957, Makeba was featured on the cover of Drum magazine.
In 1959, Makeba sang the lead female role in the Broadway inspired African jazz opera called King Kong. Among those in the case was the musician Hugh Masekela. The musical was performed to racially integrated audiences. This raised her profile among all South Africans regardless of skin color. By 1959, she had a short guest appearance in the anti-apartheid movie Come Back, Africa. It was directed by the American independent filmmaker Lionel Rogosin. Rogosin cast her after seeing her on stage in African Jazz and Variety show. She performed for 18 months on the show. The film blended parts of a documentary and fiction. It had to be filmed in secret as the government was expected to be hostile to it. Makeba appeared on stage and sang 2 songs. Her appearance in the film lasted for about 4 minutes. The viewers loved her cameo. Rogosin organized a visa for her to attend the premiere of the film at the 24th Venice Film Festival in Italy. The film won the prestigious Critics’ Choice Award in Italy. Makeba’s presence was key in the film since it showed a cosmopolitan black identity that also connected with the working class people because of the dialogue being in Zulu. Her popularity increased after the release of the movie of Come Back, Africa. She traveled into London and New York City to perform.
In London, she met the American singer Harry Belafonte. He helped her with her first solo recordings. These recordings included “Pata Pata.” That song would be released many years later. Another song was a traditional Xhosa song called, “"Qongqothwane", which she had first performed with the Skylarks. Though "Pata Pata"—described by Musician magazine as a "groundbreaking Afropop gem”—became her most famous song, Makeba described it as "one of my most insignificant songs.” While in England, she married Sonny Pillay, a South African ballad singer of Indian descent; they divorced within a few months. She moved into New York City making her U.S. music debut on November 1, 1959 on the Steve Allen Show in Los Angeles for a television audience of 60 million people. Her New York debut at the Village Vanguard occurred soon after. She sang in Xhosa and Zulu, and performed a Yiddish folk song. Her audience at this concert included Miles Davis and Duke Ellington; her performance received strongly positive reviews from critics. She first came to popular and critical attention in jazz clubs, after which her reputation grew rapidly. Belafonte worked to handle the logistics of her first performances. When she first moved into America, she lived in Greenwich Village along with other musicians and actors. She worked as a babysitter for a time.
The evil Sharpeville Massacre of 1960 changed her life forever. The massacre was about black anti-apartheid protesters being murdered by white supremacist South African police forces. After the massacre, Makeba learned that her mother had died. She tried to go home into South Africa to witness her funeral, but her South African passport was cancelled. 2 of Makeba’s family members were killed in the massacre. That is why she was concerned about her family and many of her relatives were in South Africa including her daughter. The nine year old Bongi joined her mother into the U.S. in August 1960. During her first years in America, Miriam Makeba rarely sung explicitly political music. Yet, her popularity had led an increase of awareness of apartheid and the anti-apartheid movement. Following the Sharpeville killings, Makeba felt a responsibility to help, as she had been able to leave the country while others had not. From this point, she became an increasingly outspoken critic of apartheid and the white-minority government; before the massacre, she had taken care to avoid overtly political statements in South Africa. Now, this was a different era and Miriam Makeba would become one of the greatest activists in human history.
By Timothy
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