Congolese Rumba and Other Cosmopolitanisms

Abstract

Most first-time listeners of Congolese popular dance music comment on the fact that this typically African musical style actually sounds like it comes from somewhere else: "Is that merengue?" or "It sounds kind of Cuban". Given that since the beginning of Congolese modern music in the 1930s, Afro-Cuban music has been one of its primary sources of inspiration, this is obviously not a coincidence. In historical terms, it is probably more accurate to say that Cuba and other Caribbean nations have been inspired by the musical traditions of Africa, though this is not the focus of my article. While research on the question of transatlantic cultural flows can provide valuable information about the roots and resilience of culture, I am more interested in what these flows mean to people in particular times and places and ultimately what people are able to do with them, both socially and politically. In this article I will look briefly at how Afro-Cuban music came to be imported to the Congo (in the form of a series of records referred to as the G.V. series). I will reflect on what this musical style might have sounded like to Congolese living under colonial rule, but also what kind of social significance it held for them. My central argument is that Afro-Cuban music became popular in the Congo not only because it retained formal elements of "traditional" African musical performance, but also because it stood for a form of urban cosmopolitanism that was more accessible-and ultimately more pleasurable-than the various models of European cosmopolitanism which circulated in the Belgian colonies in Africa. An exciting new literature has emerged on the topic of cosmopolitanism and precisely because of its insistence on history, it is now possible to speak of "cosmopolitanisms" in the plural and of cosmopolitan practices that take place in the periphery, topics that I will discuss in the final section of this article. But this is not how I came on the question of cosmopolitanism. When I began field research on Congolese popular dance music in the summer of 1995, the Democratic Republic of Congo was still Zaire. The Mobutu regime was in its final epileptic throes, and authenticité (Mobutu's back to the roots political platform of the 1970s and 1980s) was more often a source of humor than of pride. I was immediately struck by local ways

Dancing to the rhythm of Léopoldville: nostalgia, urban critique and generational difference in Kinshasa’s TV music shows

“…Beginning in the 1930s, Ghanaian highlife, European music (religious choirs, scout songs, and military parade music), and Cuban music were all played in and around Léopoldville by various social groups during the colonial period. Kru sailors and West Africans hired in colonial industries played Ghanaian highlife music, while Europeans sang in religious choirs, and performed scout songs and military music (Gondola 1997b, 70-71;Tchebwa 1996;Steward 2000;White 2002). All these foreign musical influences were raised on a pedestal in the colonial city due to the colonial demarcation of ethnic dance forms as obscene (Lauro 2016).…”

Education, Values, and Valuing in Cosmopolitan Perspective

“…It is a way of life in which persons are participants in pluralistic change rather than passive spectators, or victims, of such change. As Bob White (2002) puts the matter, "unlike 'globalization' or 'modernity,' cosmopolitanism is not something that happens to people, it is something that people do" (p. 681).…”

The Musical Diplomacy of a Landless Ambassador: Hugh Masekela between Monterey ’67 and Zaire ’74

“…He had also undergone a crucial political and cultural awakening that finally provided his music with the seriousness of 7 For further discussion of Cuban rumba's influence on Congolese music, see White (2002 interventions -20:7 purpose he had long sought, serving to counteract the prevailing image of African musicians as mere providers of good-time entertainment. (Veal 2000, 74) The long-awaited meeting between Masekela and Kuti in Lagos, which was based on mutual musical appreciation, turned into a close friendship.…”