BARBARA WAMALA may be thousands of miles away in the UK but the daughter of the legendary Elly Wamala is holding her own to keep her dad’s legacy fresh, writes Hassan Badru Zziwa.
Elly Wamala has quite so many musical masterpieces that 10 different people can each come up with a different ballad as the best.
Personally, the one that stands out in book is the melodious Talanta. It is so beautiful anyone can master the lyrical flow within minutes. So, I felt nostalgic recently after watching a video of the remake of the song performed by his daughter, Barbara, one of his 14 children.
If my memory serves me right, Wamala released the song in the early seventies, long before Barbara was born. But here she is in the video performing with UK-based Galaxy band, exuding great poise to hit the high notes and even takes a few moments to revel in the applause.
I have known Barbara for years, right from the days when Wamala used to bring them along to his shows and they would sometimes engage the crowd. Reaching out to her, I was astonished Talanta was not a one-off performance; Barbara is deeply rooted in music.
“I’ve spent most of my life in a musical setting and I have written over a dozen songs, secular as well as a few gospel songs – one of which is Lwaaki Tomusinza, which my sister Fiona [Wamala] recorded in the late nineties,” she says. “I may be based in the UK but I devote a great deal of my time singing or writing songs.”
Barbara mostly performs alongside her brother James Muwanga, a guitarist, in the same band. Fiona was a renowned gospel singer before she went off the boil while her other siblings Flavia, Edith and Spurgeon Wamala are also independent singers.
Incidentally, Barbara already has two albums and intimates she is working on a new project that will be unveiled soon. She released her first album Omukwano in 2013 and her next one, Omuzadde, is due later this year.
Being a musician and daughter of a legend comes with its own burden of expectations. Barbara does admit it weighs on her sometimes, given that she has not fulfilled her musical goals.
“It challenges me a lot and I try to work hard, which is not easy,” she says. “What I know is that my father’s fans take great interest in his children’s careers and I guess they expect more from us, which is why I’m working even harder.”
“It must have been 1982 when my sisters and I first stepped on stage as little girls to sing Christmas carols at dad’s concert at Pope Paul VI [memorial centre],” she recalls. “Dad had started to teach us music much earlier and sometimes he would compose a song and teach us to back him up. He sometimes had to record commercials; so, he would take us to studio to back him up.”
In 1993, Barbara and her siblings got their musical breakthrough as backup singers on Wamala’s album Sacramento. “He was always serious when it came to learning harmonies and he always made sure we took the recording seriously,” she says. “The dad-daughter relationship would be put aside and replaced with a teacher-student situation.”
GALAXY INFLUENCE
Barbara’s music career somehow never really took off until she went to the UK in 2002. It is there that she, along with Muwanga, linked up with established instrumentalists such as keyboardists Noah Kyeyune and Samuel Kadhume as well as former Afrigo band guitarist Deo Mukungu to form Galaxy band.
Other band members include bassist Godfrey Ngobi, drummer Samson Gerald, Virginia Kawere and Sam Waiswa.
“It [Galaxy band] is like a family and we all back one other on stage. Personally, I perform some of my songs, my dad’s and also do a little touch of reggae,” she says.
“The band performs at several venues around London every given weekend and, surprisingly, you will be shocked to learn that our audience is not just Ugandans…we have those from the Caribbean, West Africans and Europeans as well.”
FAMILY WOMAN
Barbara is a married mother of four and admits she has three different careers to juggle and, therefore, music is just a part-time role in her life.
“I just love to sing but on a day-to-day basis, I do my work shifts in the morning and afternoon before going for rehearsals later,” she says. “I had four children but sadly lost one! I am also currently studying.”
Though not yet an established name back home, Barbara appreciates the strides Ugandan music has made.
“Our music greatly inspires me and to see stars break out almost every year is a good sign for the industry. I love the music in Uganda and I listen to it on YouTube,” she says.