African Destiny: A talented outfit

African Destiny is an eight-member band that was born at the Midlands State University (MSU) by students from the Music and Musicology Department in 2007.
The band’s afro-fusion sound is incomparable and the band’s Decent Chambwera had the crowd on their feet with his song Ndikutambire, a happy song about a husband showing appreciation to his wife even after a hard day’s work.  
Carmen Hwarari, the band’s lead vocalist with a voice as beautiful as her face, had the audience captivated with her voice which reached notes that brought goose bumps to those that were listening.
Speaking to The Financial Gazette at their show on Friday, the band’s Taona Mutengo said the members’ love for music spurred them to form a band and become professional musicians.
“We started as students from MSU and we thought of putting all the theory we learnt at college into practice so we could be both academics and professionals as well,” Mutengo said.
“To date, we have recorded one album, and this was in January last year and it has been well received and some songs from the album are currently being played by SFM and Power FM,” he added.
African Destiny made its major entry into the music arena at the national finals of the Music Crossroads Competition in May 2007 before proceeding to represent the country at the 10th edition of the Music Crossroads InterRegional Festival held in Harare the same year.
To date, the band has performed at a number of clubs and jazz venues like Jameson Hotel, The Mannenberg and Book Café in Harare as well as The Bowling Club and The Village Lodge in Gweru.
African Destiny took part in the Songs for Life project by Music Crossroads and recorded one song on the Music Crossroads compilation album in 2007.
In 2008, they were subsequently honoured with a performance for Africa Day at the Book Café and they also participated in a number of gender awareness programmes hosted at the same venue.
After re-entering and winning the Music Crossroads competition in 2009, African Destiny went for a European Winter tour early last year where they held 23 shows in Sweden and visited 11 cities.
The band has also performed at the Jazz Appreciation Society event held at The Mannenberg with Luck Street Blues and has done other acts with Jazz Invitation.
The band members are: Taona Mutengo (guitar and vocals), Carmen Hwarari (vocals and mbira), Pritchard Chikwama (bass guitar), Louisa Mlambo (vocals, mbira and marimba)
Brian Munongwa (drums), Decent Chambwera (vocals and percussion), Raymond Mupfumira (keyboards) and Vusumuzi Mtunzi (saxophone).
Mupfumira is currently pursuing a National Certificate in Music at the Zimbabwe College of Music while Munongwa is a fourth-year student of Music and Musicology at MSU.
The rest of the band has since graduated from MSU.