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A Continuing Legacy of Song 23

can bear witness to the power and the poetry” in their “heritage of Askari song.”
He later concluded that “in the era of the two World Wars … [Malawian soldiers
10
made] a contribution to the literary record of these cataclysmic conflicts.” This
essay contends that same asilikali lyrical legacy continued, not merely through
the twentieth century, but into Malawi’s twenty-first century popular culture as
11
well.
♪ ♫ ♪
Soldiers worldwide have long sung about the circumstances of their
lives—both personal and military—frequently borrowing not only tunes but lyrics
as well from what was familiar, adapting them to their present circumstances. Not
surprisingly, following the creation of colonial military establishments, such as
the Central African Rifles in Nyasaland—as historian Anthony Clayton
observes—“the songs sung by African soldiers in peace and war reflect[ed] …
new loyalties, first to a battalion and to an army, but later on to a colony and a
12
new nation.” This adaptability of asilikali lyrics especially among Malawian
soldiers, as Shepperson also recalls, gave “vent to complaints in a manner which
makes the British soldier—often renowned for his moans on the march—seem by
13
comparison a mere amateur in the art of complaining in song.”
There is no question that both the brass band and lyrical traditions of the
King’s African Rifles (as the Central African Rifles were renamed in 1907) were
instrumental in the rapidly growing popularity of numerous musical performance
groups following the First World War. Variously known in Malawi as beni,
mganda, malipenga, and occasionally kalela societies, they certainly were
“thoroughly African” while at the same time clearly “based on European military”
14
performance. No matter the names by which they became known, all of these

10 George Shepperson, “Malawi and the Poetry of Two World Wars, Society of
Malawi Journal 43, 2(1990): 16.
11 This essay was originally prepared for the (U.S.) African Studies Association
annual meeting, Boston, MA, November 2019; the author is appreciative of
participants’ comments offered at that time. He also wishes to acknowledge with
gratitude a deep debt to the song recording efforts of other authors cited in the
notes whose conclusions about the lyrics do not necessarily support those offered
in this essay.
12 Anthony Clayton, Communication for New Loyalties: African Soldiers Songs
(Athens: Ohio University Centre for International Studies, 1978): 1.
13 George Shepperson, “‘They Went Singing’: Songs of the King’s African
Rifles,” in Malcolm Page, A History of the King’s African Rifles and East African
Forces (London: Leo Cooper, 1998), 259. [Brigadier Page is no relation to the
author of this essay.]
14 A. M. Jones, “African Music: The ‘Mganda Dance’,” African Studies 4,
4(1945): 180.