Another very scarce Kenyan guitar record on the elusive Mwangaza label founded by musician and producer David Amunga in 1964 – and I believe this side was likely recorded in 1965. This disc came to me with greying grooves full of surface noise – but the music I was able to coax out of it is an amazing listen!
Though 78 rpm records began to be phased out in the U.S. in the late 1950s, they continued to be pressed in various parts of the world well into the 1960s.
Fanuel Amimo was born in 1947 in Western Kenya – so that would have made him around the age of 18 when this record was made. His first recordings were on the Mwangaza label. He played fingerstyle omutibo guitar and here is heard accompanied by a second vocalist and glass bottle percussion.
This song title can be translated as: “Leave the child with me”. The lyrics seem to describe a poor woman with a sick child who begs her neighbors to leave the child in her care. Instead, they forcibly take the child to a traditional healer, where the child dies.
In the 1970s, Amimo would found his own record label, African Beat. He lost his sight later in life.
Amazingly, a video exists of the artist himself performing this song later in his long life in 2018!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jo3gO1wmUbE
He was also recorded performing a version of this song in the Mississippi Records 2017 release Usiende Ukalale “Don’t Sleep”; Omutibo From Rural Kenya, which was recorded in Western Kenya by Cyrus Moussavi.
https://mississippirecords.bandcamp.com/album/usiende-ukalale-omutibo-from-rural-kenya
Recorded in Nairobi, Kenya circa 1965.
Released as Mwangaza GT 21.
Credits:
Fanuel Amimo – guitar and vocals
Unknown Artist – harmony vocals, glass bottle
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