This week, I had the absolute honor of speaking to the legendary Johnny Clegg, on of South Africa's most iconic musicians. Being a recreational musician myself, I relished the opportunity to tap into his mind, to ask stupid questions and get intellectual responses and more than anything to learn from the man. Johnny Clegg will be performing in Hout Bay at the Bay Harbour Unplugged Sessions, as well as at the Baxter Theatre in Cape Town ("Rare Unplugged" Sessions) I asked him to shed some light on his current tours, his current projects and his outtake on music and life overall.

Hi Johnny, welcome to Zalebs. How are things going for you? 

Thank you very much. Things for me right now? Busy. I'm busy working, I'm preparing for shows, I'm busy with the book, I'm busy with a lot of things. 

Wow! No chance of a break for you then? Let's start with your book, what are you working on? 

My book is an Autobiography of my life, obviously, and everything that took place just before (My first band) Juluka and all the various aspects of the characters and people that came together to make this band. I talk about Sipho, how we came together and the people who helped me understand this culture. I talk about the people who taught us music- I speak about everything I can!

I'm writing it myself. The plan is to get a manuscript together- it's going to be about 200 page manuscript- and then I will have it edited and take it from there.

That sounds great. A lot of our readers have been asking about the Bay Harbour unplugged sessions as well as your "Rare Unplugged" Sessions at the Baxter. I feel like I'm using the world 'Unplugged' a bit too many times, haha. What can they expect? 

What we plan to do is take the songs that people know and love, and strip them to their bare essentials. We want people to have a rare opportunity to see how the songs were written, and how they look, sound and feel with just 3 voices and just two guitars. We want to talk about the history behind the songs and discuss the meanings and the anecdotes behind them. 

You've done it all in a glittering musical career where you've been well loved and well received; are these sessions another way to show a more intimate side of your music?

Yes I think that's the idea, I mean the intention really is to show people what music was to me when I first started. When I started making music, my primary influence was folk music. I mean, if you think about it; it's the music of the people. It's music people made when happy, or sad; when there were weddings, funerals, harvests and any other occasion. People made up songs that were passed down from generation to generation. 

Music, as a body of history that is recorded, is a very special part of our world. I like to talk about MY music and tell people, "This song that I’m about to play, made me realize… etc" 

Folk music is gaining more popularity on mainstream avenues, is this something that makes you happy? 

For sure. But I also think I think music goes in cycles. If you live long enough you start to notice, "This is coming back again!" I remember hearing Jamiroquai, and everyone thought "Wow! What a new sound!" All I heard was 70s music. Thereby folk music will always be there and it's nice to see it returning. 

Check out Part 2 of this indepth interview with Johnny Clegg by clicking here! 

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