Mango Groove is an 11-piece South African Afropop band

Musical ensemble

A musical ensemble is a group of people who perform instrumental or vocal music. In classical music, trios or quartets either blend the sounds of musical instrument families or group together instruments from the same instrument family, such as string ensembles or wind ensembles...

 whose music fuses marabi

Marabi

Marabi is an indigenous music that evolved in South Africa over the last century.The early part of the 20th century saw the increasing urbanisation of black South Africans in mining centres such as the gold mining area around Johannesburg - the Witwatersrand...

, kwela

Kwela

Kwela is a happy, often pennywhistle-based, street music from southern Africa with jazzy underpinnings and a distinctive, skiffle-like beat. It evolved from the marabi sound and brought South African music to international prominence in the 1950s....

, and pop music

Pop music

Pop music is usually understood to be commercially recorded music, often oriented toward a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short, simple songs utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes.- Definitions :David Hatch and Stephen Millward define pop...

. They have sold more than 700,000 albums in South Africa.

In 1984, John Leyden formed Mango Groove with Andy Craggs and Aaron "Big Voice Jack" Lerole

Jack Lerole

Aaron "Big Voice" Jack Lerole was a South African penny whistle player and singer, a leading performer in the kwela style of music in the 1950s, and best remembered in the UK as the leader of 'Elias and His Zig Zag Jive Flutes', who had an international hit in 1958 with "Tom...

 in Johannesburg

Johannesburg

Johannesburg also known as Jozi, Jo'burg or Egoli, is the largest city in South Africa, by population. Johannesburg is the provincial capital of Gauteng, the wealthiest province in South Africa, having the largest economy of any metropolitan region in Sub-Saharan Africa...

, South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

. Lead vocalist Claire Johnston

Claire Johnston (musician)

Claire Johnston is a singer best known as the face and voice of Mango Groove. Born in the United Kingdom, she has been a South African resident for most of her life. At age ten, Claire debuted as an actor, dancer and singer in the Johannesburg production of the musical Annie...

 joined the band soon after, during her final year as an undergraduate student at the University of the Witwatersrand

University of the Witwatersrand

The University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg is a South African university situated in the northern areas of central Johannesburg. It is more commonly known as Wits University...

. Johnston completed her Bachelor of Arts

Bachelor of Arts

A Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both...

 degree while touring with the band.

During the 1980s and 1990s, Mango Groove was one of only two popular South African music groups with both black and white band-members (the other one Juluka

Juluka

Juluka was a South African music band formed in 1969 by Johnny Clegg and Sipho Mchunu. Juluka means "sweat", and was the name of a bull owned by Mchunu.-Career:...

, fronted by Johnny Clegg and Sipho Mchunu

Sipho Mchunu

Sipho Mchunu is a Zulu musician best known for his partnership with 'white Zulu' Johnny Clegg in the band Juluka from the 1970s to the 1990s. Mchunu's Zulu compositions, vocals and guitar work brought traditional Zulu styles such as maskanda and mbaqanga to a wider crossover audience both in South...

, debuted in 1976).

Mango Groove had at least 12 number-one hits in South Africa, and are the only band in South Africa's history with an album that remained in a sales chart for more than a year. They have received nearly every South African music award and video award, as well as a number of awards internationally.

In 1992, Mango Groove performed, via satellite uplink, for the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert

The Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert

The Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert for AIDS Awareness was an open-air concert held on Easter Monday, 20 April 1992 at London's Wembley Stadium, for an audience of 72,000. The concert was produced for television by Ray Burdis and broadcast live on television and radio to 76 countries around the...

 in London, to an audience estimated at one billion people. They previously performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival

Montreux Jazz Festival

The Montreux Jazz Festival is the best-known music festival in Switzerland and one of the most prestigious in Europe; it is held annually in early July in Montreux on the shores of Lake Geneva...

, and the Rock Against Racism concert in Paris. They were the only African band invited to perform at the 1997 Celebrate Hong Kong Reunification concert.

Band members

• Claire Johnston – lead vocals
• Sipho Bhengu – tenor sax, vocals
• Beulah Hashe – vocals
• Banza Kgasoane – trumpet
• Alan Lazar – keyboards, piano
• George Lewis – guitar
• John Leyden – bass guitar
• Marilyn Nokwe – vocals
• Mduduzi Magwaza – alto sax, pennywhistle
• Phumzile Ntuli – vocals
• Gavin Stevens – drums, percussion

Albums

• Mango Groove (1989)
• Hometalk (1990)
• Another Country (1993)
• The Best of Mango Groove (1994)
• Eat a Mango (1995)
• Dance Sum More... All the Hits So Far (1996)
• The Best of Mango Groove (2000)
• The Ultimate Collection (2003)
• Moments Away: Love Songs and Lullabies 1990-2006 (2006)
• The Essential Mango Groove (2008)
• Bang The Drum (2009)

Singles

• "Two Hearts" (1986)
• "Love is the Hardest Part" (1986)
• "We are the Party" (1986)
• "Do You Dream Of Me?" (1987)
• "Move Up" (1987)
• "Dance Sum More" (1989)
• "Hellfire" (1989)
• "Special Star" (1989)
• "Too Many Tears" (1989)
• "Pennywhistle" (1990)
• "Hometalk" (1991)
• "Island Boy" (1991)
• "Moments Away" (1991)
• "Nice To See You" (1993)
• "Keep On Dancing" (1993)
• "Another Country" (1993)
• "Tropical Rain" (1993)
• "Eat A Mango" (1995)
• "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" (1995)
• "New World (Beneath Our Feet)" (1995)
• "Tom Hark" (1996)
• "Let Your Heart Speak" (1996)
• "Southern Sky" (2007)