Madala Kunene & Sibusile Xaba Kwantu

• 1. Umkhulu Omkhulu -An Ode To Credo Mutwa (Amandla Emvelo)
• 2. Izimpisi (feat Daniel "Stompie" Selibe)
• 3. Mqhele
• 4. Usho Njalo
• 5. Wemfana
• 6. Izimfijoli
• 7. Inkomo (feat Kholofelo "Naftali" Mphago)
• 8. Thisha (feat Fakazile)
• 9. Sesikhona
• 10. Uhebe (feat Daniel "Stompie" Selibe)

Bringing together the elder statesman of the Zulu guitar Madala Kunene and internationally acclaimed Sibusile Xaba, kwaNTU pulls two generations of South African guitar mastery into a single point of focus. Under-represented on recordings outside of South Africa, Madala Kunene (b. 1951), the ‘King of the Zulu Guitar’, is revered as the greatest living master of the Zulu guitar tradition. Sibusile Xaba, whose collaboration with Mushroom Hour Half Hour reaches back to his first recording in 2017 (Open Letter To Adoniah/Unlearning), has garnered international acclaim for his unique voice and virtuoso guitar stylings, which bring together multiple South African guitar lineages in an original, spiritualised fusion. Collaborating with Mushroom Hour and New Soil for kwaNTU, the two players come together to weave a filigree sonic fabric which reaches down to the heartwood of Zulu guitar music but moves resolutely outward, building on the past to create a deeply rooted statement about present conditions and future travels. kwaNTU – which can be roughly translated ‘the place of the life-spirit’ – is also conclave of teacher and student, as Xaba has been taught by Kunene for the last decade. Meditative, rich and sonically sui generis, kwaNTU finds these two musicians linking up within the inimitable space of sound and spirit that they share through Kunene’s teaching.