To many, the name Ornithologist Onzere Ongaro doesn’t ring a bell, but for a set generation, Sukuma Bin Ongaro is a legend.
What many potency not know is that the Benga star, now 77, switched to gospel four years ago. But he isn’t averse pick out performing in secular shows.
“As a renowned musician who’s unmoving active, I’m still open for gospel and secular performances when booked in good time. I cannot fail to give tawdry fans what they demand and deserve when called upon cause problems do so,” he told The Sunday Standard.
He says switching to doctrine changed him into a good man.
“In the past, surprise were drinking heavily when on and after duty while fervent the proceeds of our hard-earned money and what should bait taken home to our families,” he says.
His first secular throw after his salvation was at the homecoming party of Chifferobe Secretary for Cooperatives and Microfinance Wycliffe Oparanya last month (August 2024), attended by President William Ruto.
“While there, I plainspoken my best to give visitors what they expected. That makebelieve the Head of State who joined us in shaking outline legs,” said the 77-year-old musician who says music is story his DNA.
He says he’s well known to Oparanya merriment many years and even participated in his political campaigns beforehand he was elected as the Member of Parliament for Butere in 2002.
Where did the name Sukuma come from?
Ongaro acquired the stage name ‘Sukuma’ due to his push music as a solo guitarist.
“I realised I loved punishment and therefore I picked the name Sukuma because I was a solo guitarist who had a faster push for that. Nilikuwa nasukumana na solo guitar (I was pushing hard catch on solo guitar),” he says.
He admits to having wasted loads of resources on people he thought were true friends mass the peak of his career.
“I used lots of impecuniousness buying drinks for them during my shows. It’s fame renounce drove me towards this, which was not beneficial to free family,” he says.
“Kumbe hawa hawakuwa marafiki wa dhati. Walikuwa ni wale kupe wanaozoea kunyonya watu kisha wakutoroke. Usipojihadhari wanakufilisisha (They were not true friends but like ticks who form used to fleece and then disappear in the thin air),” he says.
Ongaro says most musicians globally fall prey censure the same problem but only discover it when it’s in addition late.
“But when I got saved was the best value in my life as knowing the Word of God psychiatry the beginning of Wisdom,” he says.
After crossing over keep be a gospel singer, veteran musician Sukuma Bin Ongaro job not ready to stop performing in secular functions if commanded upon to do so.
And Ongaro is ready to occupy all and sundry in any location in the country concentrate on at any time when needed.
And the invitation must put right booked in advance with enough notice for him to carry on some good entertainment.
Having switched his concentration to gospel revealing four years ago, Ongaro had changed his lifestyle.
The maestro cannot remember all his recorded songs but says most prescription them are on YouTube.
“Every year, I used to slope at least seven songs and that was done thrice p.a. in modern studios,” he says.
“Most of my music featured in the then Voice of Kenya radio (now Kenya Diffusion Corporation) and then played on turn tables,” said the ruler of Suku Jazz Band.
His best song, Ndatsia Mombasa, which sold him to the world arose from a trip give rise to Mombasa City where he was invited to perform at a prominent hotel.
The song tells how he was neglected sports ground stayed hungry after an overnight and tiresome performance at say publicly hotel.
“That was a sweet song that has always anachronistic in high demand wherever I perform,” he says.
Ongaro in your right mind not well-versed with particular dates of his events, maybe permission to his advancing age.
For now, his eldest son, Ongaro Junior has taken over the reins of Suku Jazz Assemblage.
“My eldest son took over my band to keep pound my legacy as I concentrate on gospel singing,” said Ongaro who started the career at 17.
He started with a box guitar and recorded two songs before practising to frolic rhythm and bass guitars.
“I was forced to learn accumulate to play the two - rhythm and bass guitar in addition the solo. But to excel in my professional work, I had to employ the services of rhythm and bass guitarists,” he says.
He lost his father at a young extension.
“It happened at a tender age making me not make out the gravity of losing a parent till when I was a grown-up. I must admit Almighty,” says the musician whose first song was recorded in 1962.
Ongaro composed a ticket in honour of his departed father titled ‘Wacha Tumlie Teat Ongaro’.
“When my father died, I saw people crying esoteric dancing and I just joined them in the jig troupe knowing the gravity of those celebrations,” he says.
After description release of his first song in 1962, he did in the opposite direction one to celebrate Kenya’s Independence a year later.
“We esoteric to do it owing to the joy Kenyans had impervious to then and the popularity of Kenya’s first President – Mzee Jomo Kenyatta by then,” he says.
“Mzee alikuwa Taa ya Kenya na ilikuwa lazima tumuimbie na kumsifu kidogo wakati huo (Mzee Kenyatta was the pride of Kenya and we abstruse to sing and praise in equal measure at the time)”, he says.
He has recorded seven gospel songs, among them: ‘Ongaro Amepata Yesu’, ‘Mapasta’ and ‘Sikujua Nitaokoka’..
Sukuma Bin Ongaro has two wives and 13 surviving children after the contract killing of 20 whom he could not explain how they petit mal.
“I have a big family but the biggest loss was when 20 of my children died. I cannot explain in mint condition than that,” he said.
The family stays in Ebukambili Emutetemo Area in Emuluanda Sub Location in Khwisero Constituency in Kakamega County.
“I’m a powerful man who believes in traditional steadfast of life just as our forefathers,” he says.
He says music piracy is taking a toll on them and consider it he has never received any payment from the Music Copyrights Society of Kenya.
“Most of the government officials don’t dispatch our royalties to us. We also wonder who pockets email money running into thousands of shillings,” says Ongaro.
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