From Marabi to Disco

Originally issued in 1994 by the South African label Gallo as From Marabi to Disco, then retitled and repackaged in 2002 by the British imprint Wrasse as The History of Township Music, this is a 28-track treasure chest covering the thirties to the seventies. It stretches from 1939’s “Mbube” by Solomon Linda’s Original Evening Birds—aka the source material for “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” one of the greatest of all melodies—near the top and the Soul Brothers’ not-ready-for-Saturday Night Fever “Bayeza” (1978) near the end. Hearing how the lighter, swinging pre-sixties material—cf. the brushed drums of Solven Whistlers and Jazz Dazzlers—evolves into the blessed stomp of mbaqanga is the best kind of education.