CONGOLESE RUMBA

THE GENRE IS CONGOLESE RUMBA

It is not every day that you encounter a footballer who can’t tell the difference between volleyball and football, but in the world of entertainment and specifically music, writers, broadcasters, commentators, and even musicians seem to get a little mixed up when it comes to identifying the genre of that Congolese popular beat, the one that was popularized by Franco.

The broader genre of the music is rumba. This beat has its origin in the Caribbean Island of Cuba, the Latin American country that ended up with significant populations of blacks as a result of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade that saw Africans traded as slaves to provide labor in the European-owned sugar plantations of Brazil, Argentina, etc.

The word 'rumba' has its etymological roots in the Spanish word 'rumbear' which means party, and worth noting is that the reality that the music Congolese do doesn't qualify doesn't cent percent qualify to be a rumba dance in the Cuban context, but rather a genre that borrowed heavily from the rumba concept, laced with local influences, then midwife by the western recording technology.

As such, the correct representation is 'Congolese rumba' as this is now specific. The Cuban effect was very prominent in the early recordings, and in fact, despite Congo being a French-speaking country, most early recordings of the 1950s were done in Spanish, a language that wasn't spoken by the musicians or the intended audience.

The original subgenres of Congolese rumba, i.e., the bolero, cha cha cha, charanga, and merengue, were a replica of the Cuban music, and even some popular songs like El Cuini by OKJ were lifted from popular Latin American musicians, as were other songs like the African Jazz mokili mobimba by Charles Mwamba, which was lifted from South America.

However, as the evolution continued to happen, more local influences found their way into the music as DRC now sought to fully own a genre they had imported. The other subsequent subgenres, like soukouss, cavacha, techno soukouss, etc were all fully locally made Congolese. These subgenres are not to be confused with styles, like odemba for OKJ, fiesta for African Jazz, kwasa kwasa, ndombolo, etc.

Rumba has no alternative spelling. Rhumba, on the other hand, is a collective noun for rattlesnakes. As such, the two terms 'rumba' and 'rhumba' cannot be used interchangeably. Each time the latter has been used to mean the former, it happens out of misinformation and/or ignorance.

It is also worth noting that the genre has also been erroneously referred to as Lingala, which is also another inaccuracy. Lingala is a language, like Swahili, and not a music genre. Lingala is a language that evolved from Bobangi, a Bantu dialect used to facilitate trade in Western DRC before the 19th century.

With the advent of colonialism, in the 19th century, it was adopted by the colonial Belgian authorities as the language of instruction. This led to the language acquiring millions of speakers in the now Democratic Republic of Congo, the Republic of Congo, some sections of Angola, and the Central African Republic. Lingala is not spoken in the entire country, which is also home to more than 250 other languages, mostly Bantu.

The official language is French, and the country has four national languages: Kiswahili (also referred to as kingwana locally), tshiluba, kikongo, and lingala. On the other hand, Wikipedia and other online publications have oftentimes referred to every Congolese musician as a soukous artist. It is worth noting that European music commentators and musicologists refer to rumba Congolese as soukouss.

Used in that context, soukous qualifies to be a genre and not a subgenre if we are to accommodate the reality that languages are dynamic.

Brazavilian veteran journalist, who has exclusively written about music/musicians, Clement Ossenonde, sought to link the music of the DRC, i.e., that of Franco, and the Cuban dance "rumba," and we came to the conclusion that Congolese rumba, in its current form, has very little if anything borrowed from the Cuban rumba, apart from the name itself. Congolese rumba it's is.

BY Jerome Ogola

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