By Sylvester Kumwenda
After decades of an outstanding career, Sir Paul Banda is ready to impart music knowledge to people interested in learning music as he is set to start offering private music lessons.
His brother, Lucius Banda revealed this Wednesday through his Facebook page when he praised Sir Banda on an outstanding and unique musical adventure his brother has had over the years.
“He taught himself how to play the guitar and sing in the seventies. He is the man who has made a lot of us exist musically. He is our teacher, our mentor, our producer. He studied jazz in Bergamo-Italy in the eighties; he can play and teach almost any instrument.
“With this background, I decided to plead with him to offer his teaching skills to those wanting to learn how to play music.
Lilongwe you are blessed, soon you will be able to enroll and end your musical illiteracy. We will soon announce how one will access him privately,” posted Lucius Banda.
In an interview with Malawi News Agency (MANA), Lucius Banda confirmed of the development saying this will give a chance to people interested in learning how to play music instruments to learn from probably one of the best the soils of Malawi have to offer.
He said the COVID-19 pandemic provided ample time for them to reflect and explore things which could have been done but never happened, one of which was providing music lessons to interested people who are ready to pay for that.
“Paul has always been a music teacher; he has taught all of us, he has taught at Andiamo, but not on a serious note, here we are talking about people actually paying.
“I am very sure he is going to put all his heart on to it. It is basically teaching someone how to use an instrument which could be a 3 or 6 months course depending on the learner,” he said.
Banda said the initial classes will be available in Lilongwe on dates to be announced in due course.
“While we are starting with Lilongwe, we will have a small secretariat helping people who are far which will be giving lessons via voice notes, video calls because Paul can ably teach via those mediums,” he said.
Banda added saying a lot of Malawians have fallen in love with music and many are eager to pursue music as a career or for their own personal use.
This he said has been witnessed by numerous purchases people are making on music instruments in the many shops in Malawi.
However, he said, many people have not had a chance to learn how to play music instruments because of lack of suitable tutors or mentors, and as such; people only keep their instruments as trophies in their homes.
“We believe this will help a lot of people especially adults, and all those who have fallen in love with music, so people must get ready,’ said Banda.
There will be two kinds of approaches; those who have an instrument will be using their own instruments while those without any will be using Yimbirani Yawe (IY) equipment.
