Prince is a Bantu, which means he is a born singer. When a child is born in Africa, singing is part of daily life. He sings in the popular wakes where professional mourners and great leaders of the voice with mournful tones express themselves. Here, for example, one learns onomatopoeia, a vocal system mastered by Prince and articulated for thousands of years by the indigenous Pygmies. “At first I sang with my throat,” he admits. It’s dangerous. Prince Kestamg then added the academic technique of the Conservatory to the traditional technique.

His American guide gave him a simple and profound teaching, “You have to sing from the heart”, the teacher said. The heart with the choir. This is the price of perfection.

A passion for opera

Prince Kestamg is from the breed of opera singers. When this Bamileke Prince raises his voice, the sound system becomes superfluous. The pitch of his voice is so high that the help of the microphone becomes unnecessary. His voice without a microphone is accompanied by the saxophone in the middle of the guests. It is explosive. In fact, in Buddhist philosophy, we speak of the Aum, a cry of brilliance capable of piercing hardened steel thanks to its vibratory rate. There’s something forest and oriental about the technique that makes it sound like the Bantu Prince Kestamg was initiated in a Tibetan temple.

Recording history

Prince Kestamg has two titles on the market, the first of which, ‘Dance Dance Beautifull People’, is a remake. Sam Fan Thomas “African Typic collection” who originally came up with this 1983’s weather bomb, praised Prince’s 2015 cover. Two versions share the Western and African audience. One more worldly, for here, the other typical for there. The song has well over a million views on his YouTube channel

In any case, with globalisation, the two versions will be interchangeable in the two rhythmic planets. The only downside is the absence of the Lingala part of Me Franco in a cover version that gives pride of place to English, Spanish and Portuguese. But, in his defence, to interpret is to recreate in his own way.