Winston mankunku biography

  • Winston Monwabisi "Mankunku" Ngozi was a famous South African tenor saxophone player.
  • Born in Retreat, Cape Town in , Winston was the first-born in a musical family.
  • Winston Monwabisi Mankunku Ngozi was born on 21 June , in Retreat, Cape Town.

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    Winston Monwabisi Mankunku Ngozi was born in Retreat, Cape Town in   His musicality emerged early on and was carefully nurtured by his mother, Gertrude. Having experimented with piano and trumpet he took up saxophone in his mid teens.   

    Along with one in three South Africans the Ngozi family was uprooted from their home and relocated to Gugulethu under the notorious Group Areas Act in the early '60's. By this time however Winston was already gigging extensively and his early influences in Cape Town included Midge Pike, Parks Joya, Cups and Saucers and Merton Barrow. But John Coltrane was perhaps Winston's greatest source of inspiration and his respect and admiration for ‘Trane’ has endured right through Mankunku's career to the present day.   

    South Africa’s Jazz was profoundly affected by Apartheid and as the regime tightened its hold during the 60’s many fine musicians and singers left including for example Miriam Makeba, Hugh Masek

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    "MANKUNKU" has become a legend in his own time, and is a name which evokes powerful musical images not only for close followers of South African township jazz, but for music lovers all over southern Africa.

    Over the last three decades, formative years in the development of SA jazz, "Mankunku" has been a beacon for trends and styles in the genre. Today, "Mankunku" is the foremost exponent of tenor saxophone in South Africa, and one of the most respected composers in jazz.

    Born in Retreat, Cape Town in , Winston was the first-born in a musical family. He started "fooling around" on the piano at age seven, and later tried his hand at both clarinet and trumpet. In his mid-teens, however, he decided that the sound of the saxophone was the sound he wanted, and started to learn the alto, then the tenor saxophone. During this period, he cites John Coltrane, local saxophonist "Cups & Saucers", pianist Merton Barrow, as well as bassist Midge Pike, in
  • winston mankunku biography

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    Winston Monwabisi Ngozi

    Winston Monwabisi Mankunku Ngozi was born on 21 June , in Retreat, Cape Town. He was the first-born in a musical family. In the ’s the Apartheid government continued its planerat arbete of racial divide, and the enactment of the Group Areas Act was the most prominent example. Ngozi’s family was one of the families that suffered from this Act. They were forced to move from Retreat to one of the local townships Gugulethu. Ngozi was a naturally talented musician, who started to play around with the piano when he was sju year old. He then later tried the clarinet and trumpet as means to advance his musical talents. As time passed he realized that his love for musical sound was the saxophone; first he learned the alto and then the tenor saxophone. This is the period in which he drew inspiration from the likes of John Coltrane, a local saxophonist known as “Cups & Saucers,” and the pianist Merton Barrow. With these talented musicians as his idols, Ngozi became a r