Samaita breaks silence

Standard Style
SUNGURA musician Brian “Mwana Mutare” Samaita has bounced back, telling his fans to look forward to more performances and a new album next month.

By Style Reporter

SUNGURA musician Brian “Mwana Mutare” Samaita has bounced back, telling his fans to look forward to more performances and a new album next month.

The Mutare-based singer says he has a lot in store for sungura lovers this year, vowing to take his music across the four corners of the country and topping local charts.

His last project, a six-track album titled Kumaziva Ndadzoka, was released in 2016. He told Standard Style that he had changed his approach this year.

“It is going to be a different year. I have so much in store for sungura music lovers and I promise them more live shows across the country,” Samaita said.

“I am in the studio working on my next album titled Ndafunga Dembo. It’s not about Dembo the person, but it is about the beat.”

Samaita is one of the few musicians who have tried to keep the late Dembo’s genre alive, with people likening his music to the late Tongai Moyo, who was labelled a Dembo “copycat”.

“You learn from others and you have people that inspire you. As for the beat, Dembo was well-ahead of many sungura musicians of their time. It is his beat that we celebrate in the forthcoming album,” he said.

Samaita has been holding low-profile shows, performing at corporate functions, church events and weddings, among others.

“I wasn’t on the mainstream music scene, but I was performing at corporate functions, in church and weddings. I believe my music is still popular because the last shows I did were well attended and my songs are regularly played on national radio,” he said.

One of the tracks on the album Kumaziva Ndadzoka, titled Ndinokutendai, was among the top 10 on the National FM Top 50 for 2016.

The artiste, whose music is more popular in Mozambique than in Zimbabwe, had previously released three albums — Nemiwo Munazvo, Murodzi Wepfungwa and Tsono — which all failed to rise to expectations.

On Kumaziva Ndadzoka, Samaita collaborated with gospel diva Agartha Murudzwa on the song Jerusarema and chanter Gift “Shiga-Shiga” Katulika added his voice on songs Ndinokutendai and Ndizvo Here.