The Sunday News
Loveness Nyathi
AWARD winning poet, Obert Dube has finished working on his latest album, Half Time and which features seasoned musician, Jeys Marabini and celebrated arts ensemble, Iyasa.
The album will be released before the end of the month.
The album, produced at Joe Maseko’s House of Rising Sound, has 14 tracks that are laced with several languages that range from Venda, Ndebele, English, Swahili, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Nyanja, Zulu, Xhosa and Chewa.
Dube said he was preparing to take his music abroad hence his move to incorporate various languages in the different songs that make up the album.
He said he had to take lessons in Spanish, Swahili, French, German and Portuguese in order to come up with lyrics for the poems.
“My dream is to take the album abroad, particularly to Europe and find new audiences for my poetry there. I have received overwhelming support in Zimbabwe and this has given me confidence to grow as a poet and fuse my poetry with music.
“That is why I sought the assistance of musicians like Jeys Marabini and Iyasa while enlisting the services of music producer, Maseko in coming up with the album. I think it gives poetry fans a different offering and at the same time I am reaching out to a new audience,” said Dube, who is a teacher by profession.
The Nama-winning poet said he named his album, Half Time because of his passion for football.
He said he is a staunch football fan who loves Highlanders hence he penned the track, iBosso, which features Jeys Marabini.
“I think half-time is a critical time in football because that is when a team assesses how they are faring and come up with strategies either to consolidate their win or comeback into the game if they were losing or how they can win the game.
“Growing up in Matabeleland it is difficult not to love Highlanders if you are a football fan, it is my team and I don’t think this is the last poem I have done for them but hopefully they will improve their game because at the moment it is not up to scratch,” added the Victoria Falls-based artiste.
Other tracks in the album are Esilojeni, Umadida, Umthandazo, Egoli, My God is Alive, Angizenzi, Akuvum’ and Reality which features vocal harmonies from well travelled ensemble Iyasa. Others are Bantwabami, Rapist, Christmas, Akusenani and Ulova.
“I think I am still growing particularly in the genre of dub poetry and I am willing to learn from musicians who have been around for a while in the industry. I would like to extend my gratitude to the Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo Foundation as they partly funded the production of the album along with Tony Boyd who is in America,” he said.
Jeys Marabini said he was happy to assist Dube in coming up with a quality product, adding that collaborations were good for the industry.
“I think with focus and hardwork he will certainly go far in his career. We worked together on the song iBosso. I have been working with various artistes and will continue to produce tracks with other musicians,” said the afro-jazz musician.
Dube clinched the top gong under the Spoken Word category at the National Arts Merit Awards (Nama) ceremony held in Bulawayo in February last year.
The poet’s love for the arts started at Siyamagoza Secondary School where he dabbled in drama and music and later formed a small imbube group with other students.
Dube was born in 1984 in Dandanda in Lupane. He started his poetry career as an acapella imbube singer with a Victoria Falls based group Ubuntu Bobuntu and never turned back from that time.
