He who had the blueprints of Malagasy music

They call him the Robert Johnson of Madagasikara. He died in 1974. The circumstances of his death are unclear. Some stories speculate that he died in jail, devastated, after accidentally killing his son by hitting him because he made a mistake on the percussions during a performance. Another story says he broke a string of his Marovany that struck his son on the head making the boy fall off-stage and break his neck. He died in grief after the incident. Another theory claims that he received a huge amount of money in royalties, bought a great deal of rum and drank himself to death.

How he joined the ancestors is not important. What matters is his role during his living. Rakotozafy of Ambohipasika is considered as the founding father of modern Malagasy music. Very little is known about the man:

• He was 1.58m;
• He made recordings in the 1960’s with DiscoMad;
• He may have visited the Wales in the 1960’s;
• His instrument was the Marovany which is a variant of the Valiha that consisted of two 12 strings sets both tuned at different scales.

That is about it. Rakotozafy lived in an era when very little things were documented. Even up to recently, Malagasy people would transmit stories orally rather than writing them down. This gives Malagasy stories a taste of mystery.

So why is Rakotozafy so important if nobody really knows who he was? Malagasy culture is transported through words and sounds and that is exactly what Rakotozafy did. He was a virtuoso on the valiha.

Many artists hailing from Madagasikara see him as their idol even though recorded material is scarce. Rakotozafy’s grandchild does play music on Kabosy and he also has his spiritual descendants. To name a few, some of them are Justin Valiha, Daniel Tombo, Rajery and Paddy Bush. Every aspect of what we recognize as “traditional Malagasy music” is heavily influenced by his sound and rhythm. His music is like classic movies, we all know how they look (or sound) and recognize quotes of it in our everyday life but chances are very few of us were exposed to the originals.