Lion Sleeps Tonight, PBS shows origins

Subject: Lion Sleeps Tonight, PBS shows origins
From: Roger in Baltimore
Date: 17 May 05 - 07:40 AM

Just received a notice about a Zulu singer who wrote the song known in the US as "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" PBS is having a show called "The Lions Trail" about the Zulu singer who wrote the song and never received one penny for royalties. For more information:

http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/lionstrail/

Roger in Baltimore

Subject: RE: Lion Sleeps Tonight, PBS shows origins
From: GUEST,robomatic
Date: 17 May 05 - 08:08 AM

Thank you, I'll keep my eye peeled.

If you do a mudcat search on "mbube" (Zulu for "The Lion") you can find previous mentions of the song and FWIW here is (not for the first time) a link to the opinionated article on the evolution of the song:

Wimoweh

Subject: RE: Lion Sleeps Tonight, PBS shows origins
From: GUEST,Azizi
Date: 17 May 05 - 09:07 AM

A couple of months ago I read a book called 'African Stars' that included information about Soloman Linda, the African composer of Mbube {The Lion SLeeps Tonight}.

I wrote extensively about this in a Mudcat thread. I'm not sure about the title of that thread. I might have included my comments in another thread about Caribbean music that discussed another example of the composers of songs being 'ripped off' and not getting the credit and royalties they deserve. I thought my posts on this subject might have been in the 'Rum and Coca Cola' thread, but they're not.

I also recall in that thread that someone had posted an update that there was a law suit entered for the Linda family so that they might receive some compensation for the use of this song by "The Lion King" producers and others..

When the Mudcat Search feature is working or when I {or someone else} can get to my archived comments, I {or someone else} can post the link to that related thread.

Subject: RE: Lion Sleeps Tonight, PBS shows origins
From: GUEST,robomatic
Date: 17 May 05 - 09:18 AM

Azizi, if you go to the upper part of the mudcat page, you'll see a search window with options to select the digitrad or forum. I did this and turned up the thread with your comments by doing a search on "mbube".

Subject: RE: Lion Sleeps Tonight, PBS shows origins
From: GUEST,Azizi
Date: 17 May 05 - 12:27 PM

Thanks, Robomatic! I followed your instructions and here is my comment on Mbube [excluding my other comments in that post]"

Subject: RE: Best Rock versions of traditional songs
From: Azizi - PM
Date: 02 Dec 04 - 07:19 PM

With regard to Soloman Linda's Mbube {The Lion Sleeps Tonight},
a very interesting book that I'm reading "African Stars: Studies in Black African Performance" {Veit Erlmann;Chicago, University of Chicago Press,1991} gives a fascinating account of the composition of this song. I quote from the book:

In 1939...He [Soloman Popolo Linda]decided to take a job offer as packer at Gallo's newly opened record pressing plant in Roodepoort [South Africa]. His choir soon attracted the attention of Gallo's talent scout Griffith Motsieloa, and before long one of Linda's songs, "Mbube {Lion}(Gallo GE 829, reissued on Rounder 5052, A5) topped the list of the country's best selling recordings for the African listenership. Like most isicathamiya tunes, "Mbube" was based on a wedding song which Linda and his friends had picked up from young girls in Msinga [a very poor section of Natal, South Africa] and whose words commemorated the killing of a lion cub by the young Soloman and his herdsboy friends.

While neither the words of "Mbube" nor its anchorage in a wedding song were particularly original, in the view of [Linda's group] Evening Bird member Gilbert Madonda, it was Linda's performance style in conjunction with other innovations that revolutionized migrant workers choral performance styles [referred to as "isicathamiya" and also known as "boloha" or "umbholoho"]".

-snip-

Sorry, I apparently didn't remember to cite the number of the page where this passage is found.


Ms. Azizi

Subject: RE: Lion Sleeps Tonight, PBS shows origins
From: GUEST,Azizi
Date: 17 May 05 - 12:39 PM

Also click Comments On Mbube In Mighty Wind Thread and look for comments from Nerd and others.

Subject: RE: Lion Sleeps Tonight, PBS shows origins
From: GUEST,Sidewinder.
Date: 18 May 05 - 11:50 AM

Saw a programme on Channel 4 last year about the origins of the song. It featured Pete Seeger and some South African groups that featured on Paul Simons' Graceland album talking about it.Nothing was resolved as I recall and some U.S. publisher continues to claim royalties from around the world- what's new! By the way I wrote the "House of The Rising Sun" if anyone's interested -just thought I'd put it on record for future reference.

Regards.

Sidewinder.

Subject: RE: Lion Sleeps Tonight, PBS shows origins
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 25 Mar 06 - 04:30 PM

I wonder if this is the best of the various relevant mudcat threads to put this on. Cut and paste from a blog I read follows:

"The lawyers sleep tonight ..."

Neil Wilkof has sent the IPKat a link, which will perish on 21 April, to this CNN item. It tells the tale of three South African daughters of the man who wrote the song "The Lion Sleeps Tonight": they have just won a six-year battle for royalties in a landmark case that could affect musicians worldwide.

The father, Solomon Linda, died in 1962 at the young age of 53. He composed his now-famous song in 1939, in a hostel that housed black migrant workers in Johannesburg. According to family lore, he wrote the song in a matter of minutes and was inspired by his childhood tasks of chasing prowling lions from the cattle he herded. In keeping with Zulu tradition the song was sung a cappella. Linda's innovation was to add his falsetto voice, an overlay of haunting "eeeeeees" to the baritone and bass main line (this style is now called Mbube, 'lion', in South Africa). The song sold more than 100,000 copies over a decade, probably making it Africa's first big pop hit.

In the 1950s, when apartheid laws robbed blacks of negotiating rights, Linda sold the worldwide copyright to Gallo Records of South Africa for 10 shillings (less than US$1.70). Gallo apparently tried to sell the work in the United States, but American folk singer Pete Seeger (left) had by then adapted a version that he called "Wimoweh" (this song was a hit in the United Kingdom for the Karl Denver Trio). Subsequently, known as "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" and attributed to George Weiss, Hugo Peretti and Luigi Creatore, it became one of the best-known songs in the world.

South African copyright lawyer Owen Dean (right, of Spoor & Fisher) argued successfully, for Linda's heirs, that under the (long-expired UK) Copyright Act 1911, which was in force in South Africa at the time Linda composed his song, all rights reverted to the heirs, who were entitled to renegotiate royalties. This statute affects all countries that were part of the British Empire at that time, or around a third of the world.

The IPKat smiles at the thought that the lawyers, having made their kill, can now enjoy their feast and sleep soundly in the knowledge that they will for once be lionised by the creative professions. Merpel says, how did the Americans manage to credit so many composers for such a teensy-weensie bit of song?

Another history of the same song here
Words (in English and Zulu) here
Sleeping lions here.

Now I suppose I'd better create teh links.

Subject: RE: Lion Sleeps Tonight, PBS shows origins
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 25 Mar 06 - 04:33 PM

CNN link
Other history mentioned
English and Zulu words mentioned