QUATRE ETOILES - FOUR STARS
30 October – Quatre Etoiles DRC
This is a feast; only blame yourself if you can’t make it.
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Les Quatre Etoiles is Nyboma, Wuta Mayi, Bopop and Syran. These legends have played with most of the orchestras in the Congo including Orchestras Baby National, Super Mosinzo, Negro Success, Bella Bella, Lipua Lipua, Kamale, Jamel National, Bamboula, Rock a Mambo, Continental, African Fiesta Sukisa, Afrisa, Ya Toupas, Banita, Jamel Jazz, Dynamic Jazz, Ewawa de Malph, Somo Somo, Lovy du Zaire, Kara and the groups TP OK Jazz, African All Stars and more
E£12 (pre-paid)/£14 at the door/£10 Members & Conc.
£20 with meal/£15 Members & Conc.
NEW: Students £8 without meal / £12 with meal
Free entry for under 10s
Free: Congolese dance classes
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Les Quatre Étoiles (Four Stars) is a Paris, France-based supergroup that features four top Zairean musicians: Nyboma and Wuta Mayi (vocals), and Bopol and Syran Mbenza (guitars). Apart from Mayi, they all worked with the African All Stars in the late 70s, with Bopol and Syran in the original line-up and Nyboma joining in 1979. The quartet came together as a studio band in Paris - a centre of expatriate Zairean musical activity since the 60s - in 1982. Their first album, Mayi, contained one lengthy track by each musician. Nyboma's contribution, "Mama Iye Ye', was a re-recorded song that he had written in the 70s when he was singing with Orchestre Bella Bella in Zaire. The new version, replacing the sweetness of the original with a solid beat and faint reggae-inflection in the guitar rhythms, showed the Étoiles" willingness to adapt their music for western ears.
The name of the band is no idle boast. In Zaire, the individual members of Les Quatre Étoiles had made their names with many of the country's best musicians. Wuta Mayi started his career in 1967 and played with Jamel Natinal, Bambala and Rock-A-Mambo before joining Orchestre Continentale, one of the bands that brought in the new youth music in the later 60s. In 1974, he joined Franco in OK Jazz. Mayi's vocal brilliance is matched only by that of Nyboma, who has one of the classic voices in Zaire - high, pure and controlled even at the top of his range. Nyboma cut his teeth with Baby National in 1969 and moved to Negreo Succes before joining Zaire's biggest bands, Orchestre Bella Bella and then Orchestre Lipua Lipua. By the late 70s he had left, to join African All Stars, later forming Orchestre Du Zaire. Syran worked as a guitarist with Orchestre Abanite and Orchestre Lovy Du Zaire, while Bopol, who released a series of his own albums in the early 80s under the title Innovations, worked as a bass guitarist with Dr Nico's African Fiesta and Afrisa before creating his distinctive, needle-sharp rhythm lines for Sam Mangwana.
E£12 (pre-paid)/£14 at the door/£10 Members & Conc.
£20 with meal/£15 Members & Conc.
NEW: Students £8 without meal / £12 with meal
Free entry for under 10s
Free: Congolese dance classes
www.menelikmusic.com tel: 01223 769 300 /07842 177 344
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