Makaya Ntshoko

South African jazz drummer Makaya Ntshoko was born in Cape Town on October 29, 1939. He grew up in Langa and played in Dollar Brand's trio and Hugh Masekela's sextet, before joining them in the cult group The Jazz Epistles in 1959. He then formed The Jazz Giants with other South African musicians, before moving to Switzerland in 1962, where he played with Dollar Brand at Club Africana between 1963 and 1965. Relocating to Denmark in the late 1960s, he accompanied Stuff Smith, Benny Bailey, Dexter Gordon and Ben Webster, and followed the evolution from hard bop to free jazz, proving himself a versatile drummer with Joe McPhee, Pepper Adams, Mal Waldron, Johnny Dyani, John Tchicai and Keith Jarrett. One of the most striking traces of this period is the album by the group Makaya & the Tsotsis, which he formed in 1974 with Heinz Sauer, Bob Degen and Isla Eckinger. The album, released by German label Enja Records, testifies to his sense of team development on long tracks, as does the live recording Hannibal in Antibes (1978), where in Marvin Peterson's band he also played alongside George Adams. In 1988, he reunited with Dollar Brand, now Abdullah Ibrahim, for two albums. On August 27, 2024, Makaya Ntshoko died at the age of 84.

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