Sunday Soul Food sessions at Blues Bar in Blantyre have been a tradition that has gone on for years now.
The sessions provide unique entertainment for fun seekers on Sunday afternoons. But on Easter Sunday, the outlook of the session was different with Afro-dance musician Saint and Namadingo in town.
The turn up at the popular entertainment joint were unprecedented. Before the performances started at 5pm there was hardly free space.
As the patrons waited for the live performances, the DJs kept things lively with a selection of both golden oldies and new sounds. All generations were covered.
It was Saint who made the first bow on stage. Just the announcement of his coming by event host Rina was enough to set a resounding uproar from the audience.
Dressed in a leather black pairs of trousers and a brown T-shirt, the Una hit maker had the audience wound up quicker than many expected. His showing had all the ingredients of an all-round performance.
The energy, delivery and pose he exuded showed how much eager he was to make an impression on the countless fans who had surrounded the make-shift stage. His renditions of songs such as Delilah had the patrons taken down the memory lane.
But predictably, it was his new compositions such as Una, Ndivayilira and Tiye kunyumba which had the audience going hilarious.
To cap it all, Afro-pop giant Onesimus joined him on stage when he performed Tiye kunyumba driving the patrons into ecstasy.
Patrons continued trickling in and the space got even smaller. There was little breathing space, but the patrons seemed unmoved. Their eyes were set on the 9pm act of Namadingo.
Few minutes before the allocated time, his supporting band was on set and the sounds of the guitars, keyboards and drums replaced the music that kept the patrons entertained after Saint’s performance.
It was another day and another white shirt for Namadingo, whose dressing style has slowly become his trademark. His arrival on stage took the mood within the venue a couple of notches higher.
Namadingo did not spare any second for pleasantries but went straight into the business of the night. He knew that was the reason why the patrons had packed the small entertainment arena.
He dished a number of songs from his debut album Mtendele. On some songs he adopted the deep reggae version while on others he opted for the acoustic style. Amid his performance, the audience managed to steal the show from him.
In unison, the crowd sang ‘Pangolin wathu mwamuona, pangolin wathu mwamuona’. He had no choice but to let the audience have it their way.
But the best was saved for the last. After continued requests from the audience, the moment finally came. Namadingo performed the two songs that had been requested throughout; Maury and Tuli. With that, he signed off on a high.
