Keturah

Keturah made her first recordings in her native Malawi in 2010 at the age of 14, but her introduction to an international audience had to wait until she travelled to Los Angeles in 2022 to record this rather splendid album with Mark Johnson and members of the Playing for Change Band. At the time she had never before left Malawi or been in an aeroplane and she arrived with a set of demos of roughly sketched melodies and folkish vocals underpinned only by lo-fi guitar. Johnson might easily have ruined the beguiling simplicity by adding a glossy westernised sheen but has done a fine job in keeping to the essence of Keturah's folk style and fleshing it out with great sensitivity on this self-titled international debut. Senegalese percussionist Magatte Sow, Zimbabwean guitarist Louis Mhlanga and kora player Prince Diabaté help preserve the African authenticity and the result is a set of gorgeous, lilting Afro pop flavour that, on songs such as ‘Kwanumkwanu’ and ‘All the Way from Africa’, evokes early Miriam Makeba, while ‘Ku Nyumba’ recalls the golden era of Congolese rumba. There are additional textures, including some lyrical sax on ‘Samala’ and the jazz piano of Jamael Dean on ‘Wewe’, but they’re added with such empathy that the spirit is never compromised.