Before delving deep into Waka Waka, let us hear the official version of the song as an YouTube video.
At the time of writing this blog at 17.35 hours, Indo China Time (ICT) of the 9th Day of October 2010, this video has been viewed 206,598,748 times in the official Vevo channel of Shakira. It has become the number 3 all time most viewed music video and number 4 all time most viewed video.
As Cindy Casares wrote in her blog on the 12th of April 2010, “We've been kind of obsessed with Shakira's new song for the 2010 World Cup ever since the clips were first leaked. “Waka Waka (This Time for Africa)”, (originally called “Zangalewa” or "Tsamina Mina" on the internet), has this fantastic African chorus, and it turns out that's because it's sampled from a Cameroonian song first recorded in 1986, called "Zangaléwa," that was hugely popular in Shakira's native Colombia, (not to mention all over Africa). The part of the original song that Shakira samples most closely is the chorus which doesn't begin until seven and a half minutes into the original song”.
The same feelings were expressed by Robert Mackay writing in his column in The New York Times of 24th May 2010. As he wrote, controversy was building up around the origin of the song much before the scheduled start of the World Cup matches. The organizing committee had to issue a clarification that this world cup anthem was collaboration between the Latin star, Shakira and the South African band, Freshlyground. Mackay went on to write, “For her part, Shakira Mebarak Ripoll has not invoked her credentials as a representative of the global meeting pot — a Latina of Lebanese ancestry, she sings in both Spanish and English — but instead stressed the global nature of her effort to try to teach the world to dance the Waka Waka. She has a YouTube channel that encourages fans from every part of the planet to submit clips of themselves dancing to the song. Her official Web site points to video of recent “Waka Waka flash mobs” in Colombia and Venezuela and kids at a school she founded in her hometown performing their version. What has gotten less attention is the fact that the song’s central “Waka Waka” riff has impeccable African roots”.
Tsamina or Zangaléwa is a 1986 hit song, originally sung by a Cameroonian Makossa group called Golden Sounds who were beloved throughout the continent for the dances and costumes. The song was such a hit for Golden Sounds that they eventually changed their name to Zangaléwa, too.
Here is the song, Zangaléwa, by Golden Sounds.
Zangaléwa (Audio only)
The original song is quite long and the portion which has inspired the World Cup anthem does not appear before 7.26 minutes. That is quite a long wait. I thought it best to upload the audio as I am not very happy with video quality of the YouTube video. However, for those of you who are interested in watching the video, you can find it here.
The best treatise on this subject can be found in Dibussi Tande’s blog and I have borrowed quite substantially from his writings.
In 1985 the Golden Sounds, a group composed primarily of members from Cameroon’s Presidential Guards released an album whose title track Zangalewa was based on a parade song which was popular with the rank and file of the Cameroonian army and whose origins could be traced back Cameroonian riflemen who took part in the Second World War. Zangalewa became an international hit which transformed Emile Kojidie, Victor Dooh Belley and group leader Ze Bella into celebrities (to the dismay of the army brass who subsequently created the conditions that led to the disbanding of the group a few years later – but that is another story). The group also included a few members who were not in the military such as Annie Anzouer who with Ze Bella performed some of the group’s most popular tunes such as Maladie difficile à soigner
and Un bébé, and who later went on to have the most successful solo career among all Golden Sounds members.
Fast forward to 2010. Ze Bella who had retired from the Presidential Guards in 2002 was enjoying a quiet retirement in his village when he got a call from an acquaintance in France informing him that Shakira had just released a version of Zangalewa. This information was soon confirmed by Emile Kojidy another Golden Sounds alum now living in the United States. They were both right.
A few days earlier, the Internet had been inundated with buzz about the new song by Columbian pop star Shakira titled “Zaminamina” which was rumoured to be the official anthem for the FIFA 2010 World Cup. To many listeners, the song was eerily familiar and many bloggers and journalist sought to find out the origins of the song.
To Cameroonians and many African, the origin of the song was no mystery as they instantly recognized it as a remix of “Zangalewa”. Thus began a frenzied online campaign to alert the world that this was not a Shakira original but a remix. The task was made all the more easier thanks to videos of the Golden Sounds performing Zangalewa that were available on the web. The campaign picked up steam as the international media began taking an interest in the story. [See for example, this report on the French cable news channel France24 titled "Shakira Used Cameroonian pop song for World Cup anthem… without asking".
In an interview with Cameroon Tribune, which ran a special report on the controversy, Ze Bella, the leader of the defunct group declared that while they were proud that a “world music icon” had remixed their song as the World Cup anthem, they nonetheless expected to be properly credited and adequately compensated. He however lamented that there was little they could do if Shakira or Sony refused to pay up:
Nous sommes vraiment impuissants pour aller aujourd’hui aux Etats-Unis revendiquer nos droits. Il y a au moins une trentaine de groupes de par le monde qui ont repris les Zangalewa. / We are really powerless to travel to the United States to assert our rights.
On May 11 2010, some members of Zangalewa held a press conference in Douala, Cameroon, to inform the media that negotiations were well underway with Sony and Shakira who had agreed to an out of court settlement and that Sony mauling over the possibility of including the single on Shakira’s next album scheduled to be released at the end of the year. Didier Edo, the group’s manager conceded that it had not been easy to negotiate with Shakira’s manager, Sony Music, and all other interested parties.There are at least 30 groups that have remade Zangalewa and below is a YouTube playlist of 11 songs
The majority of these songs are from different African countries and they have been posted by YouTube users much before the World Cup song by Shakira was even conceived. All these support the fact that Shakira and Sony Music were inspired by the original number by Golden Sounds which the Columbian artist and the corporate house, initially, declined to accept.
Let us now turn our attention to the second song, called the "Official Theme" of World Cup 2010. The ambiguity lies in naming the song as the official theme, confusing people all over the world about its place in the World Cup history. This immensely popular song called "Wavin' Flag" by the Somalia born Canadian artist K'Naan has never been the official song designated by FIFA. In reality this song was chosen as Coca-Cola's promotional anthem for the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Here is the song
| K'naan - Wavin' Flag .mp3 | ||
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 | Found at bee mp3 search engine |  |
If you search the history of this song it is evident that this particular song was recorded by K'Naan in 2008 for his album "Troubadour". It was chosen as the "Coca Cola" anthem or the World Cup 2010 and officially recorded as "Wavin'Flag" in the album "The Celebration Mix". Here is the original cover version of the song from the album "Troubadour"
The remix of "Wavin' Flag" was part of Coca-Cola's global integrated marketing campaign "inspired by the joyous dance celebrations familiar to Africa." Coca-Cola integrated its jingle, well known from previous Coca-Cola commercials, into the mix, generating a direct association between the remixed song and the brand.
A music video was shot for "Wavin' Flag (The Celebration Mix)", which includes a guest appearance by Damian Marley (son of Bob Marley). It is interesting that this video was recorded in Estadio Centenario in Montevideo, the site of the first 1930 FIFA World Cup Final.
Once the Celebration Mix was released, "Wavin' Flag" ascended to the summit of the national charts in Germany, Switzerland and Austria as well as number two in the United Kingdom, Canada, Italy and Ireland.
Here is the video from "The Celebration Mix" from K'Naan's official channel on YouTube. He is candid in admitting by adding a note "ATTENTION : This is NOT the official video or song of the 2010 FIFA World Cup". I appreciate his honesty.
There have been many official and unofficial bilingual versions released till date due to the immense popularity of the song. Here is an integrated version.
For those interested in more details the playlist follows
The songs in order of appearance are – Arabic (Nancy Ajram), Portuguese/Brazilian (Skank), Chinese (旗开得胜 – Chi-Khai-Do-Sho; Hit the ground running by Jackie Cheung & Jane Zhang), French (Fefe), Greek (Professional Sinnerz and Komis X), Indonesian (Ipang), Japanese (Ai), Nigerian (Banky W and M.I.), Russian (St1m), Spanish (David Bisbal), Thai (Tattoo Colour), Caribbean (Machel Montano), Haiti (Mikaben), Hungarian (Nálunk van a labda by archors & sports reporters of Hungarian Television – MTV), Indian ( Jasim), Somali (Gulled Ahmed), Italian (Mr. Blaza and MagicEmy), Mongolian (P.Bayartsengel, D.Anu, E.Solongo and E.Soyombo), Srilankan/Sinhala (Ekama Irak Yata" by K'naan, remixed by Pradeep), Vietnamese (Phuong Vy).
An international remix of "Wavin' Flag" features French music producer David Guetta and American rapper/producer and Black Eyed Peas frontman will.i.am and has been made for an international release outside of Canada. A big part of the will.i.am solo parts were newly written for the international version, and even for the K'naan part, some of the lyrics were amended.
In early 2010, the song was remade by a supergroup of Canadian artists, credited as Young Artists for Haiti, as a charity single to benefit relief efforts following the 2010 Haiti earthquake.
The charity single was spearheaded by producer Bob Ezrin and was reworked to include specific lyrics for Haiti (including a rap solo by Drake) and was released on March 12, 2010 with proceeds going to Free the Children, War Child Canada and World Vision Canada.
Participating soloists included (in order of appearance) K'naan, Nelly Furtado, Sam Roberts, Avril Lavigne, Pierre Bouvier, Tyler Connolly, Kardinal Offishall, Jully Black, Lights, Deryck Whibley, Serena Ryder, Jacob Hoggard, Emily Haines, Hawksley Workman, Drake, Chin Injeti, Ima, Pierre Lapointe, Elisapie Isaac, Esthero, Corb Lund, Fefe Dobson, Nikki Yanofsky, Matt Mays, Justin Nozuka and Justin Bieber.
Performing the chorus (including the soloists) were Arkells, Lamar Ashe, Broken Social Scene, Torquil Campbell, Canadian Tenors, Aion Clarke, City and Colour, Tom Cochrane, Jim Cuddy, Jim Creeggan, Kathleen Edwards, Dave Faber, Jessie Farrell, Colin James, Pat Kordyback, Brandon Lehti, Colin MacDonald, Jay Malinowski, Stacey McKitrick, Suzie McNeil, Stephan Moccio, Kevin Parent, Josh Ramsay, Red 1, Hayley Sales, James Shaw and Shiloh.
I am reminded of "USA for Africa".
It has been a long discussion on the songs associated with FIFA World Cup South Africa 2010 that have made history. Please post your comments as they serve as inspiration for me. My next post will be on "The Musical Truth of FIFA World Cup Brazil 2014".
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