Johnny Clegg, English-South African singer-songwriter and guitarist
Jonathan Paul Clegg, OBE, OIS (7 June 1953 – 16 July 2019) was a South African musician, singer-songwriter, dancer, anthropologist and anti-apartheid activist, some of whose work was in musicology focused on the music of indigenous South African peoples. His band Juluka began as a duo with Sipho Mchunu, and was the first group in the South African apartheid-era with a white man and a black man. The pair performed and recorded, later with an expanded lineup.
In 1986 Clegg founded the band Savuka, and also recorded as a solo act, occasionally reuniting with his earlier band partners. Sometimes called Le Zoulou Blanc (French: [lə zulu blɑ̃], for "The White Zulu"), he was an important figure in South African popular music and a prominent white figure in the resistance to apartheid, becoming for a period the subject of investigation by the security branch of the South African Police. His songs mixed English with Zulu lyrics, and also combined idioms of traditional African music with those of modern Western styles.
1953Jun, 7
Johnny Clegg
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Events on 1953
- 28Feb
Francis Crick
James Watson and Francis Crick announce to friends that they have determined the chemical structure of DNA; the formal announcement takes place on April 25 following publication in April's Nature (pub. April 2). - 6Mar
Joseph Stalin
Georgy Malenkov succeeds Joseph Stalin as Premier of the Soviet Union and First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. - 8Apr
Jomo Kenyatta
Mau Mau leader Jomo Kenyatta is convicted by British Kenya's rulers. - 19Aug
1953 Iranian coup d'état
Cold War: The CIA and MI6 help to overthrow the government of Mohammad Mosaddegh in Iran and reinstate the Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. - 30Oct
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Cold War: U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower formally approves the top secret document National Security Council Paper No. 162/2, which states that the United States' arsenal of nuclear weapons must be maintained and expanded to counter the communist threat.