Pictures of the week: Cee Jay in Harare show

Our photographer spent time with US based afro-jazz singer/rapper Kudakwashe ‘Cee Jay’ Besa who was in the capital Harare as part of his Ndangariro Tour. He held a couple of shows including one at Mannenberg before he travelled to South Africa for three more shows there.

Cee Jay was launching his third album Ndangariro and held shows in Harare, Bulawayo and Mutare teaming up with the likes of Alexio Kawara, Willis Wataffi and Q-Montana. He told our snapper he wants to see jazz and urban grooves musicians performing together in Canada before the end of the year.

“I have talked to Nox Guni, Sani Makhalima, Stunner and Ex-Q in relation to the programme. A US company wants to host young musicians from Zimbabwe in tours of UK, US and Canada. We hope the programme will be successful so that we can give most of these talented youngsters international exposure,” he said.

Cee Jay has in the past curtain-raised for Zimbabwean artists like Alick Macheso, Oliver Mtukudzi and Allan Chimbetu on their US and UK tours. It is this interaction which has seen him shifting from his original hip hop style to Afro-Jazz.

“Afro-jazz is a more mature and challenging genre. While it is easy to compose hip-hop beats on a computer, this genre needs the real instruments and I have done a lot of work to come up with my debut jazz album titled Ndangariro.”

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