In the early 1970s, one of Portugal’s fastest runners was an Angolan. He was also secretly carrying messages for the independence movement. When the Portuguese police came for him, he fled, and began a second life as a singer.
Bonga was born José Adelino Barceló de Carvalho in 1942 in Angola, then a Portuguese colony. He grew up in Luanda’s musseques, the poor neighbourhoods where semba music thrived. As a young athlete, he moved to Lisbon and became a record-breaking sprinter for Benfica and the Portuguese team.
Exile
Bonga sympathised with the struggle for Angolan independence and became involved in activities supporting it. The Portuguese secret police, the PIDE, began to watch him. In 1972, he fled to Rotterdam, in the Netherlands, where there was a community of Cape Verdean and Angolan exiles.
Angola 72
In Rotterdam, Bonga recorded his first album, Angola 72. Sung mainly in Kimbundu and Portuguese, it included “Mona Ki Ngi Xica”, a song of mourning and longing for home. His hoarse, emotional voice, the dikanza scraper he played and the simple acoustic arrangements made the album unforgettable.
The album was banned in Angola and Portugal but circulated secretly. It became a soundtrack of the independence struggle and of Angolan identity. He followed it with Angola 74, recorded as the colonial regime in Lisbon was collapsing.
Independence
After the Carnation Revolution in Portugal in 1974, Angola became independent in November 1975. The country then plunged into a long civil war. Bonga, living in Europe, continued to sing about Angola, its people and their suffering.
Semba
Bonga is one of the great voices of semba, the Angolan music often described as a forerunner of Brazilian samba. Semba mixes Angolan rhythms with guitar and percussion, and it later influenced kizomba and kuduro.
Later career
Bonga has recorded dozens of albums and toured the world. His song “Mona Ki Ngi Xica” has been covered and sampled many times. He is regarded as a national treasure in Angola, and he has kept touring and recording well into later life, with the dikanza scraper still part of his sound.
Listening
Angola 72 is essential. Listen to “Mona Ki Ngi Xica” first, then the rest of the album in one sitting.
He ran for Portugal and sang against it. Half a century later, Angolans still hear independence in the crack of his voice.
