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‘They boxed me with their love!’ exclaimed Busi Mhlongo immediately after a recent benefit concert in her honour. CRAIG CANAVAN was there to chat to the legendary Urban Zulu in the euphoric aftermath.

Far too often, benefit and tribute-style shows tend to be slapdash affairs, thrown together at the last minute with little forethought or care. Not usually the kind of concert any artist worthy of the name would want to be associated with. Not so, the recent glitzy, glam and quite glorious tribute concert for Busi Mhlongo organised by the SABC. The occasion was both happy and sad – Mhlongo celebrated her 60th birthday on October 28, in the midst of a battle against breast cancer. But the amount of care, thought and pure passion that went in to putting on the inaugural Vuka Sizwe Benefit Concert, held on the final weekend in October in Johannesburg (and broadcast live on SABC 2) had to be witnessed to be believed.

Guests included fans from the street to music industry VIPs to President Thabo Mbeki, sporting a grin almost as wide as that one he wore a week earlier while helping John Smit hoist the Webb Ellis trophy at the Rugby World Cup final.

The list of musicians who came to lend their talents and show support is a good indication of the high esteem in which Mhlongo is held – Thandiswa Mazwai, Simphiwe Dana, Max Ntambo, Dorothy Masuku, Ringo Madlingozi, Sibongile Khumalo, Siphokazi Maraqana, Judith Sephuma, Phuze’khemisi, Ray Phiri and others sauntered on and off the stage, playing and singing their hearts out in what was a massive – and somewhat overwhelming – show of love and respect.

And in the middle of it all sat a slightly bewildered Mhlongo, somewhat frail and a little wan due to her continuing fight against breast cancer, but brimming over with the energy of a natural-born performer and the sheer delight of finally getting her due recognition.

“They boxed me with their love!” exclaimed the Inanda-born singer and composer backstage after the show, tears trickling from her face. At first breathless from excitement and emotion, a little speechless at the generosity and admiration of both the crowd and her fellow artists, Busi was soon chatting and laughing with all and sundry, whether she knew them or not.

‘They knocked me out with their love. It was…I don’t know how to say it! I’m just so happy and proud and alive. Tonight I feel like I could live forever,” she enthused before exhorting everyone backstage to hug and kiss all who passed them by and “send them my love”. It was just that kind of night.

And can there be any one artist in our country more deserving of such recognition? Mhlongo is right up there with the greats of South African music, deserving to be mentioned in the same breath as Miriam Makeba, Dolly Rathebe and Hugh Masekela. She is one of the few to truly deserve the much-abused and over-used title of ‘legendary.’

Mhlongo grew up with a song on her lips. Despite being raised within her family’s strict Methodist tradition, a tradition that sadly had little recourse to the music she loved, Mhlongo sought out other religious denominations with musical services so she could follow her first love.

Her professional breakthrough was thanks to the success of the ‘60s musical King Kong, the cast of which she later joined. Before that, however, the musical’s triumph caused a talent drought when many of the popular musicians of the day left the country to tour with the show internationally. So Gallo Records held a talent competition and Mhlongo went to Jozi and won it.

Strangely enough it would take the performer another three decades before she recorded her debut album, Babhemu , in the mid-’90s. Prior to that she spent three decades performing across the globe after opting to go into exile, leaving her husband (the drummer, Early Mabuza) and daughter behind. Her departure came just one year into her marriage to Mabuza, and a year after she left, Early Mabuza died.

“It was so sudden it devastated me,” she says. “I didn’t know what to do at first, so I poured myself in to performing. It’s what saved me. It’s what continues to save me. I have no regrets. If I had the chance to do it over maybe I would do it differently. Looking back it was a mistake, but I made a decision and I stand by it. I am not going to allow my life to be shadowed by those ’70s decisions, right or wrong.”

Performing in Portuguese casinos, Mhlongo was also first made aware of the importance of sticking to her cultural heritage.

“Before I spent time in Belgium I was reluctant to perform any African-language songs,” she explains. “In South Africa at the time we had to sing in English if we wanted to get paid – I won that Gallo competition by singing My Boy Lollipop – but in Portugal I heard bands from Angola performing in their indigenous languages and the crowds loved it.

“I still started my sets with the popular hits of the day, but ended them with African songs, both my own and traditional hits. It was that decision that helped make my reputation.”

After many years abroad, including stints in Canada and the US where she became good friends with the late, great American painter Jackson Pollock – who was so entranced by Busi he put together her very own musical revue called Ship of Fools – Mhlongo returned home and started building a reputation as one of the most vibrant musical performers the stage has ever seen.

The stage is Mhlongo’s home. It’s her church. She has released a trio of very fine albums – Babhemu, Freedom and the incomparable Urban Zulu. The latter was number one on the Billboard world music charts for two months. And still one of the finest albums to ever be produced by a South African. But to discover the essence of Mhlongo the artist you have to hear her live on stage.

Watching her perform with the kind of energy usually reserved for hyperactive five-year-olds, one is left in no doubt just how important performance is to Mhlongo. Without it, she says, she would die.

It is the thought of performing regularly again that keeps her holding her head up high during this second difficult, painful battle with cancer – she was first diagnosed with the disease back in the ‘70s. She thought she’d licked it and that the treatment at the time was successful.

Though she has had to undergo the pain of a partial masectomy, and continues to receive radiation therapy on a weekly basis, leaving her weak and rundown, Mhlongo is adamant that, as the old cliché goes, the rumours of her demise have been greatly exaggerated.

“As long as I have a voice and a platform from which to use it, I will be fine,” she says defiantly.

And anyone who doubted her will to live and perform would have been greatly surprised at the zest she displayed during the tribute show, snatching the microphone away from her peers mid-concert to belt out a tune or two with all that old Mhlongo magic shining through.

“Thank you,” she said to me backstage after the show. “Thank you for being here to share this wonderful night.”

No, Mhlongo, you have got it wrong. Thank you for allowing me, for allowing us, to share in one of the greatest musical talents to ever grace the stage. We are all the richer for it and long may it continue.

pulseditor@gmail.com

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