Emmanuel Dibango N’Djocke- "Manu Dibango". The Lion of African Music.

Emmanuel Dibango N’Djocke popularly known as Manu Dibango was born in Douala on December 12, 1933. On the international scene, he is known as the Cameroonian saxophonist, pianist, vibraphonist and composer whose “innovative jazz fusions and wide-ranging collaborative work” played a significant role in introducing European and North American audiences to the sounds of West African popular music between the mid-20th and the early 21st century.

Dibango was born into a musical Protestant Christian household to parents who represented two Cameroonian ethnic groups historically known for rivalry: his mother was Douala and his father was Yabassi. Dibango’s musical aptitude became evident at an early age through his singing at the local church.

Manu Dibango is Cameroon's, and perhaps Africa's, best-known jazz saxophonist. Starting in the 1950s, he became a globe-trotting musician, living and performing in France, Belgium, Jamaica, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Cote d'Ivoire, as well as in Cameroon. In 1960, Manu Dibango became one of the founding Members of the Congolese band African Jazz, with which he spent five years. World attention was turned to him with the release in 1972 of Soul Makossa, a work that actually had touches of the precious makossa sound in it, and scored later hits with Seventies and Ibida. Manu Dibango’s output has been prodigious and multi-faceted. He has worked with musicians from diverse backgrounds like Fela Kuti, Sly Dunbar, Robbie Shakespeare, Don Cherry, and the Fania All-Stars. In addition to being one of the leading jazz saxophonists of his generation, Manu Dibango has also run nightclubs, directed orchestras, and started one of the first African musical journals. A later release, Polysonik featuring English rapper MC Mello, Cameroonian singer Charlotte Mbango leading a choral section, and sampled pygmy flutes shows that Manu Dibango is continuing to flourish and expand in challenging new directions.

It is almost impossible to find a fitting description for a musician such as Manu Dibango who has made such an enormous contribution to African music as a whole. He is a saxophonist, nicknamed 'The lion of Cameroon', from a track on The Very Best of African Soul album.  Originally trained in classical piano, his musical career began in Brussels and Paris in the 1950s. 1960 found him in Congo as a member of African Jazz led by Joseph Kabasele (Le Grand Kalle)! He formed his own band in Cameroon in 1963 and moved to Paris in 1965. His international breakthrough came in 1972 with Soul Makossa. 
Manu Dibango is extraordinarily versatile, having played almost every style of music you care to mention: soul, reggae, jazz, spirituals, blues... Manu Dibango features on albums by Angelique Kidjo, Anne-Marie Nzié, Frederique Meiway and Kékélé Kinavana, 2006. On his Wakafrika album of 1994, many top African and international musicians contribute. In 1985 Manu raised funds for famine-striken Ethiopia through his successful 'Tam-Tams for Ethiopia' project with Mory Kante and others.
Manu's first album was recorded in 1969 and in 1970 he accompanied Franklin Boukaka in a classic 12-track album. In the year 2000 two albums were released: Anthology, a boxed set of 3 CDs and Mboa' Su   which includes a new arrangement of Franklin Boukaka's track 'Aye Africa' (Le Bucheron), made for the millennium celebrations on Robben Island in the presence of Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki.

 In 2000 Manu gave a concert in Cameroon after many years away and was given the honour of the Cameroonian of the Century together with football star Roger Milla. In 2002, an album with a difference was released entitled B Sides with most of the tracks re-mastered from recordings in the 1970s where Manu plays, not sax, but the marimba and vibraphone.

 There are Rough Guides to the music of whole countries but Manu warrants one all to himself: the 13-track album The Rough Guide to Manu Dibango (2004) has the full range of his songs, classics and rarities .
Manu's autobiography was originally published in French in 1989 with the English translation, Three Kilos of Coffee, published in 1994. The book makes fascinating reading as Manu describes his experiences personally. In 1984 he originated the word 'negropolitain'.
Manu performed alongside Cuban Clave Y Guaguanco at the Barbican in London in 1999 and played there again in April 2001 with the spectacular Afro-Funk Big Band including Richard Bona, Claude Deppa and Tony Allen. In 2003 he was on stage with Ray Lema at WOMAD. In September the same year Manu was in London with the Soweto String Quartet for an evening of songs of struggle and liberation.

 To celebrate his 70th birthday Manu held a unique concert with special guests at London's Barbican in October 2004. Earlier in 2004 he was named as UNESCO's Peace Artist of the Year.
 

A major event for 2007 was Manu's celebration of his 50 years in music, coinciding with the release of a CD/DVD The Lion of Africa. Manu paid tribute to jazz composer and musician Sydney Bechet, who had been a powerful motivating force in his life, in an album Homage to New Orleans: Manu Dibango joue Sydney Bechet (2007).

 In 2011 Manu went on to collaborate with Wayne Beckford for a new version of 'Soul Makossa' as well as an album Past Present Future. Visit www.manudibango.net. For example he was at the 2012 Kriol Jazz Festival in Cape Verde in which Cesaria Evora was honoured.

He has collaborated with many other musicians, including Fania All Stars, Fela Kuti, Herbie Hancock, Bill Laswell, Bernie Worrell, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, King Sunny Adé, Don Cherry, and Sly and Robbie. In 1998 he recorded the album CubAfrica with Cuban artist Eliades Ochoa.

Early life

Dibango was born in Douala, Cameroon. His father, Michel Manfred N'Djoké Dibango was a civil servant. The son of a farmer, he met his wife travelling by canoe to her residence in Douala. She was a literate woman who was into fashion designing, running her own small business.^] Both her ethnicity, the Douala, and his, the Yabassi, viewed this union of different ethnic groups with some disdain.

Emmanuel had no siblings, although he had a stepbrother from his father's previous marriage who was four years older than he was. In Cameroon, it is traditional for one's ethnicity to be dictated by their fathers, though he wrote in his autobiography, Three Kilos of Coffee, that he has "never been able to identify completely with either of his parents.
Manu Dibango's uncle was the leader of his extended family. Upon his death, Dibango's father refused to take over, as he never fully initiated his son into the Yabassi's customs. Throughout his childhood, Dibango slowly forgot the Yabassi language in favour of the Douala.. However, his family did live in the Yabassi encampment on the Yabassi plateau close to the Wouri River in central Douala. While a child, Dibango attended Protestant church every night for religious education, or nkouaida. He enjoyed studying music there, and reportedly was a fast learner.
In 1941, after being educated at his village school, Dibango was accepted into a Colonial School, near his home, where he learned French. He admired the teacher, whom he described as "an extraordinary draftsman and painter." In 1944, French president Charles de Gaulle chose this school to perform the welcoming ceremonies upon his arrival in Cameroon.

Albums

• Manu Dibango (1968)
• Saxy-Party (1969)
• O Boso (1971) London/PolyGram Records
• Soma Loba (1971)
• Soul Makossa (1972) Fiesta Records (France), London Records (UK and Canada), Atlantic Records (US)
• African Voodoo (1972)
• Africadelic (1973)
• Blue Elephant (1973)
• Makossa Man (1974) Atlantic Records released as Pêpê Soup on Decca Records
• African Funk (1974)
• Makossa Music (1975) Creole Records, licensed from Société Française du Son
• African Rhythm Machine (1975)
• Countdown at Kusini O.S.T. (1975) D.S.T. Telecommunications, Inc.
• Manu 76 (1976) Decca/PolyGram Records
• Super Kumba (1976) Decca/PolyGram Records
• The World of Manu Dibango (1976) Decca Records
• Ceddo O.S.T (1977) Fiesta Records
• L'Herbe Sauvage O.S.T. (1977) Fiesta Records
• Disque D'Or (1977)
• A l'Olympia (1978) Fiesta Records – a live double album
• Anniversaire Au Pays (1978) Fiesta Records
• Afrovision (1978) Mango/Island/PolyGram Records
• Sun Explosion (1978) Decca/PolyGram Records
• Le Prix De La Liberte (1978) Fiesta Records
• Big Blow (1978) Derby Records – re-issue of Afrovision with a track from L'Herbe Sauvage OST and the extended single version of the song Soul Makossa
• Gone Clear (1979) Mango/Island/PolyGram Records
• Ses Plus Grands Succes (1979)
• Home Made (1979) African Records
• Ambassador (1981) Mango/Island/PolyGram Records
• Waka Juju (1982) Polydor/PolyGram Records
• Mboa (1982) Sonodisc/Afrovision
• Soft And Sweet (1983) Garima Records
• Deliverance (1983) AfroVision Records
• Surtension (1984)
• Electric Africa (1985) Celluloid
• Afrijazzy (1986) Enemy Records
• Négropolitaines, Vol.1 (1989)
• Deliverance (1989) Afro Rhythmes
• Happy Feeling (1989) Stern's
• Rasta Souvenir (1989) Disque Esperance – a reissue of Gone Clear & Ambassador (compilation)
• Polysonik (1991)
• Bao Bao (1992)
• Negropolitaines, Vol.2 (1992)
• Autoportrait (1992)
• Live '91 (1994) Stern's Music
• Wakafrika (1994) Giant/Warner Bros. Records
• Lamastabastani (1996) Musicrama
• Sax & Spirituals (1996)
• Papa Groove: Live '96 (1996)

African Soul – The Very Best Of Manu Dibango (1997) Mercury (compilation

• Manu Safari (1998)
• CubAfrica (Cuarteto Patria with Eliades Ochoa) (1998)
• Mboa' Su – Kamer Feelin' (1999)
• Collection Legende (1999)
• Anthology (2000) (compilation)
• The Very Best Of Manu Dibango: Afrosouljazz From The Original Makossa Man (2000) (compilation)
• Kamer Feelin' (2001)
• B Sides (2002)
• Dance With Manu Dibango (2002)
• Africadelic: The Very Best Of Manu Dibango (2003) (compilation)
• From Africa (2003) Blue Moon
• Lion of Africa (2007) – live album including bonus DVD
• African Woodoo (2008) from tracks recorded between 1971 and 1975 for cinema, TV, and advertising.
• Choc'n'Soul (2010) features Sly and Robbie
• Afro Funk (2010)
• Afro Soul Machine (2011) (compilation)
• Past Present Future (2011) features "Soul Makossa 2.0" with vocals performed by Wayne Beckford
• Ballad Emotion (2011) (mostly jazz standards)
• Africa Boogie (2013)
• Aloko Party (2013)
• Lagos Go Slow (2013)
• Balade En Saxo (2013)

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