idalina and the
manjuandades
music and dance to community service
Idalina lives in bairro Luanda, the most problematic of Bissau. Tells of being the rainha, the queen: “I'm the boss, the one who reigns. Our group is founded and formed only by women”.
The Manjuandades (in Creole) are women's associations: are based on equality and solidarity and were born from the desire of women to make private needs and personal collective interests. In perspective that, together, everything becomes easier: from solving a wedding’s “problem”, to take reciprocally counsel over their children.
Women dance during public events, animate the parties and carry on the tradition. For the Manjuandades composing music and writing lyrics is an act to the community, a way to tell their land, together with all the colors and shades that belong to it.
The Luanda group that we met in Bissau was founded in 2008; since then he participates in weddings, funerals, events and public events.
The money with which they are reimbursed for their performances is used to finance their artistic activities, to buy the fabrics with which they create their costumes, covers for drums and ornaments. “We do not use the money for food or personal purchases - explains Idalina - These activities are a manifestation of our tradition”.
The rainha is at the center who sings the song, while the group of women gathered in a circle responds keeping time with small wooden percussion. The men are playing. When the rhythm begins to rise begins the real show: the chorus of voices intensifies, the music takes hold to become veritable soundtrack of that little glimpse of Bissau. The other women and musicians pass a colored tissue, who is holding must enter the circle and make his performance. “In Africa there is no shame”, says one of the drummers in a moment of pause, “everyone wants to dance in public and share what you feel inside when we do it”. Lyrics and music of the songs performed by Manjuandades are written by the group, which meets regularly to create new melodies to be proposed to the public.
“Guinendadi is something that you feel in your heart; it is our culture, our tradition. Feel part of this country. It is be Guineans”. Guinendadi as a feeling of belonging, as a way of being: "means to be children of Guinea Bissau", says one of the musicians. Tell their own land, through the art and music, is - according Idalina – the highest expression to contribute to its development.
