Lulu sparks in Sand Fest Blantyre party
Lawrence Khwisa better known as Lulu put up a spirited performance at the Sunbird Sand Music Festival party at Motel Paradise in Blantyre on Friday night.
The Sunbird Sand Music Festival came up with two parties starting off with Blantyre on Friday which spilled over to the early hours of Saturday and then Chez Ntemba in Lilongwe on Saturday.
Despite having the presence of South Africa’s group Trademark featuring Zinhle Ngidi famed for the hit ‘Shumaya,’ Lulu was the toast of the night.
Lulu performed for a long time and kept the not- so- impressive audience on their feet from start to finish with his songs including ‘Kumalembe,’ and ‘Nzalera.’
Featuring a four member band with him on lead guitar, Felix Jere on bass guitar and Chisomo Ngondo on keyboards among others, Lulu’s sound was faultless.
No wonder he was forced to perform a few songs when his time was almost up.
With the entry fee at K5,000 on the door, not many people showed up to the concert but Sand Music Director Lucius Banda said this show was all about quality and not quantity.
“We are satisfied with the audience, this was a show about quality and not quantity and so we are happy with the turnout,” he said.
Lucius said they organised the parties to thank Malawians for their support during this year’s festival held at Sunbird Livingstonia in Salima from October 30 to November 1.
The party whose master of ceremonies was Times TV presenter Annie Matumbi had some gaps which the organisers have to look into critically if they are to improve.
The South African group also performed late on around to 3am with Lucius closing the chapter performing until 5am.
Lucius backed by his Zembani Band also did well on the night dishing out several songs from his many albums.
The songs included ‘Nthawi,’ ‘Samuel,’ ‘Mabala,’ ‘Mphawi Uja,’ and ‘Esther.’
Zembani Band dancers also were at their best as usual colouring Lucius’ songs with their energetic dance moves and it is even perfect now following the return of veteran female dancer Jane Khongwa who was on maternity leave.
There were a lot of expectations from the South African youthful group which started their act with a performance from Trademark.
The two male members of Trademark showed their skills on the decks dishing out songs some of which were originally done by other South African artists.
But it was the coming in of female singer Zinhle Ngidi, which brought in much life to their act as her voice attracted the attention of the audience so too her dancing antics.
She teamed up with Trademark dishing out close to four songs including ‘Shumaya,’ which was a familiar track to people in the hall before leaving the stage.
The group showed potential as they danced with energy on stage but they do not have enough songs to keep the audience going.
“We are excited to perform in Malawi being the first time. We didn’t know what to expect but we have known that Malawians embrace different artists and so we felt at home and we hope to come back,” said Zinhle.
Asked as to why they performed a few songs, Zinhle said they have more songs but then many are strange that is why they only selected the ones Malawians can relate to.
“This was also a platform for us to sell our music and now we have done that. We will be releasing an album next year and we are looking forward to come back. Again we are looking at doing collaborations with Malawian artists,” said the singer.
Other artists who performed on the night included Nepman, who has enjoyed support with his songs such as‘Nalelo,’ Sam Simakweli and Wendy Harawa.
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