David de Lange - Suikerbossie (Sugarbush, 1936)

While the previous song I posted (http://youtu.be/n7rgSfLo7iY) harped back to the miserable time the Afrikaners went through in the early 1900s, not everyone was crying in their soup. David Petrus de Lange was one of those individuals who refused to collapse under the weight of past.

Prior to the political intervention of the FAK on the Afrikaans Culture in the late 1930's, Boeremusiek was a wild, untamed genre full of influences from across the entire continent and beyond - including Jazz, Ghoema and Marabi. The music came out of the working class and its heroes were miners and railway workers - and none more incendiary then David de Lange, whose career blazed for a brief six years.

In the 1930's de Lange was by far the most famous Afrikaans singer in the country. His first huge hit was "Waar is Moeder?" (Where is Mother?, 1934) and he was the first person to introduce "Suikerbossie" (Sugarbush) to a wide audience. Eric Gallo himself later said that the Gallo Record Company (then Gallo Africa) would not have survived those difficult years if it was not for David de Lange's incredible popularity.

But when de Lange died in 1947 at the untimely age of 41, not one Afrikaans newspaper reported his death. Despite selling almost a million records very little is known about him today. So what went wrong?

De Lange was a rebel, a man who liked and sang about booze, partying and women. He also translated black American jazz-music into Afrikaans. Furthermore, his friend George Abrahams was a "coulored" guy who claimed to be a Jew (his grandpa was). As a result, the so-called decent Afrikaners made De Lange out as an embarrassment, a poor white mineworker who did not fit the profile of what the establishment wanted Afrikaners to become and his records were banned by the SABC (South African Broadcasting Corporation).

De Lange became a broken man, never recovering from the hurt the establishment put him through. When De Lange died, something wild and untamable in the Afrikaner died with him, and boeremusiek became sterile.

Fortunately today with Apartheid on the ash heap of the past, there is somewhat of a revival in this wild and experimental spirit amongst the younger bands like the Radio Kalahari Orkes. We can expect to see much more experimentation and excitement in the future.

http://www.kalahari.com/music/Die-Nagloper/19996/32430520.aspx

http://tinyurl.com/3m67vzk
("Who was David de Lange?", translated from Afrikaans)

http://boeremusiek.org/orkesteenkarakters.html#DawidDeLange
(Afrikaans Only)

Some of the musicians on this recording:
================================

David de Lange - vocals
Willie Welgens - concertina
Rup Meyer - double bass
Gert Naudé - guitar
George Abrahams - banjo
Dan Truter - clarinet

"Suikerbossie" was composed by Fred Michel and this recording (Gallotone Singer GE 264) by David de Lange and Willie Welgens' band sold over 200,000 copies - a record for those days. After this runaway success Welgens' band became known as the "Welgens Suikerbossie Orkes".

http://www.boeremusiek.org.za/Afrikaans/Biografie/Musikante/Welgens_Willie.htm (Afrikaans)
http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=af&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&am... (English via Google Translate)

Listen to the flip side of this album here: http://youtu.be/eJsvtL2r1Qo

Category:

Music

Tags:

• music
• Africa
• South Africa
• Afrikaans
• folk
• oldies
• vintage
• David de Lange
• Willie Welgens
• Welgens Orchestra
• Welgens Suikerbossie Orkes
• Welgens Suikerbossie Orchestra
• Suikerbossie
• boeremusiek
• concertina
• konsertina
• classic
• Singer GE 264
• Gallotone
• Gallo
• Singer
• GE 264
• Dan Truter
• clarinet
• George Abrahams
• banjo

[Jantak]

Due to a bug in YouTube neither video responses nor the link to which this video is a response show unless the comment counter is > 0. This is a test comment to increase the counter.

[Jossop080]

Hierdie is deel van ons Boerevolk se erfenis en kultuur. Dit is wonderlik dat dit op hierdie manier behoue kan bly. Musikante wat die konsertina só kan bespeel, is dun gesaai.  "Well done"