Zimbabwe’s singer who found fame in China – mystery at home Arts and Culture

Harari, Zimbabwe – The year 2017 was Joe Stack – wearing a red evening jacket, a bow tie and a Humburg hat – connecting the Mandarin song.

The red and yellow lights around it as a crowd of chanting fans who flare science on the Chinese version of the sound gave an existing applause at the end of his work.

The Passtek Past delivery process for a Chinese song in 1992, which is called the world, needs warm hearts on national television.

Stack recalls, “I was invited to perform in The Voice as a guest of a year.”

It reflected the peak spot while it became known in China. In Douyin, the China version of Tiktok, had about five million followers. It has appeared in some of the largest television stations in the country. Street fans stopped him to order a photo or just a conversation. The singer Zimbabwe was riding high.

“Being black in China makes you stand out naturally,” he explains. “I was music (so) made me more prominent.”

The people who stopped him liked that the foreigner would sing in the mandarin.

Some “big deal”

Today, in the capital Zimbabwean of harare, Joe Takaouirra – the real name Stak – is an unclear figure walking on the street in Budiro 5, and she is the suburb of the working class where he was born and brought up. In 2019, seven years later in China, his work visa ended, and he returned home.

He wears his distinctive beard, gray sports pants, sneakers and a black shirt, lights up a cigarette.

He stops street sellers who sell fresh products and spices, stops at a chat corner with a friend, then passes his day. Whenever he ran to someone he knows, he greets them with a fist and smile.

When at home, Stak listens to useful music and writes songs in mandarin.

“This is the way I spend my time in Boderro,” he says.

It is a long feeling from China and the profession that I enjoy there. He did not find the same praise in the homeland.

Even his neighbors had no idea about his previous life.

Clemens Cadzumba, who runs a tire store in the Stack neighborhood, had no idea that his neighbor was so that some of his customers who were among the 20,000 Zimbabwe who lived in China had recognized him.

“I couldn’t believe it,” says 43 -year -old Cadzumba.

“They were very excited to see him, just as it was a big problem. However, here he was hanging out with us as if nothing.”

An unexpected trip to stardom

Stack’s music journey has its roots at the Methodist School, which is run by the Church, which was attended by adolescence.

He sang in his church’s choir, something he loved, and was part of a group of students who recorded an album.

It has achieved the album well, and some songs have nearly a million views on YouTube.

Stack says, in the middle of three brothers. His older brother wrote songs at school while the younger brother plays the piano.

After graduation, Stac joined the study of the mandarin in China in 2012, motivated by his love for Chinese culture, which started as a boy watching Jackie Chan. He was 20 years old when he moved to Shanghai.

This came at a time when Zimbabwe was moving away from the West with the “Look East” policy of the late leader Robert Mugabe, which was adopted in response to the sanctions of the United States and the European Union after the 2002 presidential elections marred by violence.

Mugabe opened the doors of Zimbabwe to Asia, which led to the flow of Chinese investment, as more of Zimbabwe went to China to work or study.

By 2014, Stack was mastered in the Mandarin and began publishing videos of himself singing in the Mandarin to Dwayne. “I wanted to explore music in a different language,” he explained, lighting a cigarette and sitting on his chair on the balcony of his red house.

He was singing the songs of R&b Hop Hop and pop songs in Mandarin and English and began to book the vehicles.

He recalls, “It was my first disturbance in Yuyingtang, a musical bar in Shanghai,” he recalls. He says the place was not very large, but it achieved $ 1500 – which is enough to pay for its food and stay for several months.

This party made him realize that he could earn money from his talent, and may represent the beginning of his career as a professional Pop singer in China.

Next, play in musical bars, festivals, wedding parties and night clubs – mostly performance in mandarin.

Of the 37 songs, one of which was in the top ten in the service of broadcasting Chinese music Baidu. “This means a lot for me,” Stack says enthusiastically, although he got only 5,000 yuan ($ 865).

Then in 2017, he joined the Foundation, a group of musicians from Africa, the United States and Europe that led to Chinese and Western pop hop music at weddings and night clubs.

As the main vocalist, he caught the attention of Chinese TV networks, which led to offers at the main stations.

“I was surprised by my success in China,” Stack admits.

Life was good. Its daily routine consists mainly of “eating, singing and drinking”.

Its favorite dish was Hotpot – a meal cooking raw ingredients such as seafood and tofu in a shared bowl of broth on the table.

He says, “Until now, when I miss her, I go to Chinese restaurants.”

He would have performed at night, and during the day, he was wandering along the historic waterfront of Shanghai with the structure of the colonial era and surface bars.

Plasting a good money. “They pay the artists well-I mean $ 1,000 USD as a minimum for a 10-minute offer.”

But he also felt acceptable and at home in China, where he says that the music industry welcomes foreign talents and invests in it.

Unlike many foreign artists who sing English and who could struggle to storm the Chinese market, Stack had an advantage – it was African singing in the Mandarin, and there were a few artists like him. His ability to perform the popular Chinese songs that he loved for the fans.

Return home for not revealing his identity

Then in 2019, the Stack visa ended. 27 years old, he returned to a country that was in the midst of a A devastating economic crisis.

His parents – his father as an engineer, and his mother, was a teacher – they were dealing, but throughout the country, people were fighting with hyperplasia, foreign currency deficiency and unemployment rate of more than 50 percent.

Stak found action as a translator – and he quickly discovered that the landscape in Zimbabwe and social media were not familiar to him.

He says that many of his fame and success came from Chinese applications, most of whom are Dwayne. But the applications that he relied on are only available in China, where Beijing restricts foreign digital platforms through “The Great Protection Wall“.

Without them, Stack could no longer reach his Chinese audience.

His career disappeared when Shanghai left. “I feel part of me remained in China,” he explains.

In Zimbabwe, no one knows him. The recording of some music began – and he is considering switching to the Bible, which is popular in the country – but he struggled to promote his songs. When he called a local radio station to play his music, he has never heard.

Stack believes that if the Chinese social media is available to the international fans, it will still have a prosperous musical profession.

“This would bring me international recognition,” he says.

Currently, the translation works are driving well. It currently works in a Chinese mining company, translating the English language or Xona into mandarin. When he does not work, he tries to write music, but working full time leaves little time to re -invent itself or find an audience for Chinese pop music.

Longing for the stage

Today, Stack is torn. He dreams of returning to China, but he also wants to rebuild his musical career in Zimbabwe, where he hopes to marry and raise a family.

“I want to start again here,” he says.

“But I miss China as well,” it is a “very good and welcoming country.”

Whether it is in Asia or Africa, it can return to the theater. He says, “I miss the lights.”

Five years after he left China, Stack is still common. Two months ago, his Chinese boss downloaded a video of him singing in the mandarin. (He) posted me on his position in WeChat, and people were asking him about me. They were like, “Where is this man? “

Stack takes a moment and then adds, “Chinese love me.”