We first featured Niwel Tsumbu in 2010 when he was being interviewed alongside Liam O’Maonlaí by Donal Dineen on his late-night show The Small Hours. Dinnen had set up his boundary-pushing Parish Recordings project, and their first release, Hi Five-O, featured Niwel alongside Aminah Dastan, Liam O’Maonlai, Stephen Mogerly, Rónán O Snodaigh (Kila) & Seán MacErlaine.
Niwel Tsumbu hails from the Democratic Republic of Congo, where he spent his youth growing up in Kinshasa. He picked up the guitar at a young age and showed a natural ability for learning Soukous and Rhumba, the music of his homeland. The music began to distract him from his school work which his mother responded to by banning music from the house. This didn’t discourage him; he found ways of escaping to play with other musicians and returning home undetected.
He later discovered other forms of music, from jazz and rock to classical music. His passion often meant covering long distances on foot to play in bands, and that fire has continued since. He moved to Ireland in 2004, where he struck up a great rapport with many Irish musicians and collaborated with the likes of Sinéad O’Connor, Liam O’Maonlaí, Donal Lunny, Glen Hansard, as well as international stars such as Ma Xiaohui (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon soundtrack), Senegalese legend Baaba Maal and more. As well as featuring in the Irish band Jiggy, Niwel also led his own band RiZA from which we featured Kabembe as a Song of the Day.
More recently, he played on the Grammy Award-winning album They’re Calling Me Home (by Rhiannon Giddens and Francesco Turrisi). It’s an absolute pleasure to feature Niwel again; watch below the accompanying video to ‘Kanzenzenze’, his beautiful arrangement of a traditional Congolese folk song.
‘Nobody really knows the origin of Kanzenzenze’, Tsumbu says. ‘The version I am singing is in Tshiluba, one of the many Congolese languages. It is believed to be an ancient song about ten fingers and ten toes.’
‘Kanzenzenze’ evokes youthful days spent playing with friends, and it explores how childhood memories can comfort us throughout our adult lives. ‘It’s a song we’d sing as kids while playing a game. You sit close to each other in line, pointing at your feet, singing while counting your feet with your fingers. Whoever the last note ends on, he or she is out.’
The comfort of those distant memories is emphasised by his warm vocals and his intricate nylon string guitar-playing. ‘I could have added many other instruments but I refrained,’ Tsumbu says. ‘Because of the lockdown, I spent most of the last two years playing and singing by myself, so I felt like that should be reflected on the music.’
The music is soothing, visionary and rich in detail. It’s a stunning single and is the first in a series of Congolese folk song arrangements Tsumbu will be releasing.
The video was directed and edited by Simon O’Neill and features Esosa Ighodaro, Orsene Kembetia and Vinny Dimuka Kamanda.