Tendayi Gahamadze

Tendayi Samaita Gahamadze, founding member of Mbira dzeNharira

This article has multiple issues. Please help or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these template messages) The topic of this article may not meet Wikipedia's notability guideline for biographies. Please help to demonstrate the notability of the topic by citing reliable secondary sources that are independent of the topic and provide significant coverage of it beyond a mere trivial mention. If notability cannot be shown, the article is likely to be merged, redirected, or deleted. Find sources:  –  ·  ·  · scholar · JSTOR (April 2017) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) This article contains content that is written like an advertisement. Please help by removing promotional content and inappropriate external links, and by adding encyclopedic content written from a neutral point of view. (April 2017) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

Tendayi (Samaita) Gahamadze (born 3 July 1959) is a Zimbabwean artist and songwriter.

Tendayi Samaita Gahamadze of Mbira dzeNharira

Background[]

Tendayi Gahamadze was born at his parents' farm in Musengezi and went to Mkwasha Primary School. He went to Moleli for secondary education.

In 1979 he left for the United Kingdom where he did his A levels and studied metallurgy from 1982 in Germany.

Career background[]

Tendayi Gahamadze was a member of a school choir and learnt to play instruments when he was in the UK. He was fascinated by the sound of Mbira but did not expect to play the instrument. Whilst in Germany at a seminar in Essen he and his fellow Zimbabwean students had no option but to sing Ishe Komborera Africa in contrast with the Congolese and Latin American students who played their Rhumba and Salsa music respectively. On coming back to Zimbabwe he was told that it had been prophesied that he would be a prominent mbira player. He brushed it aside and wondered how at age 30 he would learn to play this instrument. A year later he found himself under the mentorship of spiritual leader Choshata of the Mhara Mbuya Chikonamombe totem. He spent a year living with Albert and Benjamin Gobvu who were respected mbira players in Mhondoro. The assisted in the tuning of the mbiras but never attempted to play since to him it seemed far beyond his capabilities. Choshata recommended that Tendayi buy his own Mbira, which he did.

With this Mbira he went to another Mbira manufacturer, Seke, who made two more mbiras of the same tuning for him. He left Choshata's shrine for Norton where his family was. With him now was a set of three mbiras which he could not play. It just happened overnight, as it were, that he started playing the mbira without being directed by anyone. He started teaming up with different mbira players and performing with them at cultural ceremonies and gatherings. Magwimbe Mlambo and Wilfred Mafrika were with him in the beginning. Having had some guitar band experience with college bands during his time at university Tendayi went on to buy guitar pick-ups and started manufacturing his own mbiras and electrifying them. He formed the group Mbira dzeNharira which had its first recording, Rine Manyanga Hariputirwe, in 1998 which immediately topped the charts. To date Mbira dzeNharira has won five musical awards.^[1][2]

See also[]

• Mbira dzeNharira
• List of mbira players
• List of Zimbabwean musicians
• Mbira music
• Shona music
• Music of Africa

References[]