Childo Tomas and the family affair
Mozambican bass player and vocalist Childo Tomas talks to RFI about the joys of making his first solo album - The roots of Mozambique - after nearly two decades of playing in other people’s bands.
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Bass guitarist and vocalist Childo Tomas is a big man with big hands and a big, warm laugh.
He sits in the dressing room ahead of a concert by Cuban pianist Omar Sosa with whom he's been playing for more than a decade.
"It's good, but after so many years I needed to do something of my own, to express myself," he explains. "This project has given me so much energy."
Audio Report - Childo Tomas
The project in question is his debut album Moçambique Ni N’Tumbuluku (Mozambique with roots).
Tomas describes it as a "gift" – the sum of 15 years worth of touring many parts of the world.
He has drawn his inspiration partly from his native Mozambique but also from Spain, Morocco and India .
He left Maputo for Spain in 1994 and the earliest song was written back then. Others have been penned over the years between tours.
Tomas sings in Ronga, a local language from south of Maputo.
He defends both his native language and traditional instruments from Mozambique like the mbira, known commonly as the thumb piano.
The track Mbira Mbira is a spiritual song, that draws on the trance qualities associated with the instrument.
The song "is like opening the window each day,” says Tomas. “I like mbira because I can play it like the bass, it has a bass, it has rhythm, it has melody parts.”
Tomas also plays the timbila – a large xylophone used by the Chopi people from the Zavala region north of Maputo.
He denies mastering the instrument, but uses it to great effect on the track Timbila: a dance til you drop song that has one foot in Africa and one in any self-respecting European dance hall.
The album couldn’t have been made without the help of fellow musicians and close friends in and around Barcelona . And of course his family.
Tomas’ two daughters are both classical music students and they play violin and sing throughout the album.
“It’s a family project,” he says with a hearty laugh. “We even have two gigs as a family band.”
Making this album has inspired him to go further and he hopes there’ll be a follow up.
Even if there isn’t, he’s realised his dream of going solo... just before turning 50.
“I feel good,” he says. And it shows.
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