Johnny Clegg

Johnny Clegg performs during the 46664 concert in celebration of Nelson Mandela’s life at Hyde Park on June 27, 2008 in London, England. (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

South Africa loses an icon: Tributes pour in for Johnny Clegg

South African musical icon and anthropologist Johnny Clegg has been honoured with a slew of tributes after he succumbed to cancer on Tuesday.

Johnny Clegg

Johnny Clegg performs during the 46664 concert in celebration of Nelson Mandela’s life at Hyde Park on June 27, 2008 in London, England. (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

South Africans have reacted with shock and sadness to the news that musical icon Johnny Clegg lost his battle with cancer on Tuesday.

Known as umZulu omhlope or the white Zulu, Clegg embraced Maskandi music at a time when it was taboo and his resulting body of work is one that brings the country together.

Clegg won a Grammy in 1994 for the album Heat, Dust and Dreams made with the group Savuka. They were just the second South African act to be honoured at the prestigious awards.

His music has become part of the patchwork that is South African culture and tugs on the heartstrings of those who have left Mzansi.

The Springboks have made liberal use of one of his greatest hits, the song Impi which commemorates in song the Battle of Isandlwana, where Zulu warriors defeated the might of the British Empire despite a vast disadvantage in weapons technology. The song is used as a rallying cry and inspiration to stand up for what is right no matter the results.

Last December, a group of South African musicians and entertainers recorded a cover of one of Clegg’s classic tracks The Crossing as tribute to his work.

South Africans have taken to social media to share their grief and remember Clegg’s contribution to the Rainbow Nation.

Clegg was born in England to an English father and Rhodesian (Zimbabwean) mother but moved to South Africa as a young child. Under the tutelage of Charlie Mzila, a flat cleaner by day and musician by night, Clegg mastered the Zulu language, maskandi guitar and isishameni dance styles. He was arrested at the age of 15 for violating apartheid-era laws in South Africa banning people of different races from congregating together after curfew hours.

Clegg also did important work as a scholar and anthropologist lecturing at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) and the University of Natal, and writing several seminal scholarly papers on Zulu music and dance.

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