How Salim Junior changed mugithi

The recently deceased Salim Junior (Paul Mwangi), was largely synonymous with Mugithi, a genre that has redefined the soundscape of Gikuyu music in the last two decades. Salim Junior belonged to a generation of other celebrated Mugithi artists like Mike Murimi and Mike Rua; all who were protégé's of Queen Jane, also deceased.

A tribute to Salim Junior then would be a tribute to the import of mugithi in the terrain of Kikuyu music.

Mugithi has grown over the years, and each wider audience is armed with its own tools of interpretation of the lyrics, depending on the situation. Revellers will hold on to each other’s waists, forming a human ‘train’ that goes round and round the venue, responding to the call of the guitarist/vocalist.

It could be a wedding, a graduation ceremony or a religious meet. Mugithi performances are not just restricted to the bar, although this is where it all began. As club managers sought to cut on the costs, they started employing the services of a one-man guitarists who would do the vocals and play the guitar at the same time.

The mugithi performance blends various rhythms into a beat that will resonate with the audience. Versions of many country songs have been rendered in the same gusto as local and regional beats.

But Salim’s single biggest contribution to the genre, and to the Kikuyu music, was the revival of classic hits that date back to the 1950s. Great music from greats like Roman Warigi, John Ndichu, Lawrence Nduru, Francis Rugwiti, Joseph Kamaru, DK wa

Maria and many others has found itself back on the music shelves, thanks largely to Salim Junior’s cover versions.

Interestingly, younger listeners experiencing the music for the first time would have difficulties, or disbelief, that they are singing to the same tunes with their aged parents.

A friend of mine had a heated debate with her mother, disagreeing on who sang the song Muti uyu Mukuona. The mother had to retrieve a vinyl record from the 1960s by Kamaru to settle the argument.

RECURRENT THEMES

Whereas the song evokes a nationalist fervour among the older generation, the younger audience would be more interested with the bawdy and sexual innuendos in the song, as popularised by the Mugithi artist. The songs, thus, are subject to various

interpretations.

Apart from the many renditions by popular musicians of yore, Salim Junior had to his credit a number of gospel albums. I am not sure if one would term them kigooco, or mugithi, because, in a mugithi performance, the profane and the sacred share the same place, the old and the young shake their leg to the same tunes, in the same way as a believer and non-believer.

While most of Salim’s lyrics in the cover versions reflect the concerns of the original songs, there is a recurrent theme of unfulfilled love, deceit and mistrust in relationships, a common motif that dominated the music of the 1960s and the ‘70s. One of his

songs, Kari Kii Wonire, a collaboration with Sam Muraya, rehashes a date gone sour. A cover version of JB Maina’s Muiritu wa Kabete answers to the same.

Undoubtedly, mugithi music dabbles with the politics of the day, but in such humour that a first listening will completely leave the audience clueless, again because at that particular moment in the performance, entertainment is the main objective. But

repeatedly, the coded message will get through.

Salim Junior would want us to cry and laugh at the same time as we bid him goodbye. However, his contribution to the music of Kenya provides fodder not just for revellers but for academic research. Retracing Kikuyu Popular Music by Ketebul Music and

The Politics of Everyday Life in Gikuyu Popular Music by this author are some of the works that tackle this genre.