By Brenda Kageni
Even before the MC at the 2009 Groove Awards ceremony finished reading out the nominated entries for Artist of the Year from Tanzania, the crowd had begun chanting "Rose Muhando, Rose Muhando…" Not surprisingly, Muhando of Mteule Uwe Macho fame won the coveted title. The singer, famous for her strong, emotional voice, vibrant stage performance and her energetic dance troupe enjoys enormous popularity in Kenya, in her home country Tanzania and in other East and Central African countries. Her 2008 hit Nibebe from the album Jipange Sawa Sawa makes her undisputedly the biggest female gospel artiste in the region.
From a modest musical background she rose to lead singer with Moshi-based Mamajusi Anglican choir with which she recorded such songs as Halleluyah and Homa ya Dunia before she left to join St Mary’s Chimuli Anglican Church choir, Dodoma.
Household name
Although she is a household name in the region, she says she is most popular in her country. In 2005 she was named Best Female Gospel Musician at the Tanzania Music Awards, as well as best composer and best singer. Her debut album, Uwe Macho, was named best album at the awards. The album released in 2004 featured songs such as Mteule Uwe Macho, Yesu Nipe Uvumilivu, Yesu Nakupenda, Kina Mama, Mwambieni Mungu and Nakaza Mwendo became one of the most played in Kenyan homes, matatus and churches, catapulting her to celebrity status with a bigger than life profile.
Rose Muhando at the recent Groove Awards. Photos: Pius Cheruiyot |
Muhando began singing in school and although her parents are singers, she is a self-made artiste. She was 13 years into her career when she released the first album in which she is backed by an entourage of ten energetic singers cum dancers from her St Mary’s Chimuli choir.
Tribulations
Muhando attributes her success to the love of God and the trials she has been through.
The song Nibebe, for example, came to her in September last year while she was on her way to a tour in Chicago. Prior to that she had been accused of conning a Tanzanian pastor, Dickson Chilongani of Dodoma, of TSh9 million (Sh514,000) and thrown in jail.
"This was opposition to prevent me from going for the meeting. I went to America feeling hurt. I heard a voice in my head singing nibembeleze nibebe (soothe me and carry me). My name has been mentioned in many scandals but I don’t break. Instead I get stronger. My second album is greater than the first," she says.
Muhando’s painful past, which left her a single mother of three, to a large part informs her music.
Born 33 years ago in Dumila village, Kilosa district of Morogoro region, Muhando began to experience head pains at the age of six. She had wounds and a swelling on her head that made her appear to have two heads, according to Nyakati a Tanzania newspaper. She was miraculously healed at the age of nine and thereafter became a Christian.
The real tribulations, however, begun after the three fathers of her children rejected her when she informed them she was pregnant. These experiences inspired the song Nipe Uvumilivu (give me perseverance) as her children suffered for lack of basic needs after their fathers neglected them and their parents threw her out because they did not want her pregnancy to scandalise their Christian families.
The song resonates with many Kenyan women living in abusive relationships and Muhando recalls thousands of children in Congo blocking the road and begging her to sing the song.
Despite her new celebrity status, Muhando has managed to maintain a humble, pleasant and open disposition as well as clarity of purpose. And if the young men tripping over themselves backstage to get a photo of her is anything to go by, she is quite the femme fatale too.
