CeeJay Tshuma brings Cafeteria Jamz to Bluez Cafe

On Saturday 10 February from 4pm, Bluez Café proudly hosts a gifted young musician and songwriter of Bulawayo, Marvellous ‘CeeJay’ Tshuma – already well known and endorsed by his peers in music circles of the City of Kings – and his band Cafeteria Jamz.

Self-described as of the Contemporary Afro-pop genre, the show is titled ‘Ikaya lami’ (my home) and CeeJay says “my musical style is purely from the heart…”. Ikaya lami is inspired by the fact that we all come from many different backgrounds and different situations – and the many stories around that. The February 10 show will deliver fresh original compositions by CeeJay, as well as his renditions of a few anthems of his generation.

CeeJay has found his home in music, throughout his childhood a refuge from the pains of life. Raised in the SOS Children’s Village in Bulawayo, he started playing the marimba at the age of 6, and by 10 was part of a band by the Musical Box schooled by SOS music director at the time, Mr John Gara who went on to teach him piano and bass at the age of 12. His love of music grew along with his hunger to learn more.

He now plays – and always still learning! – 22 musical instruments of diverse origins, from piano, bass, guitar and drums, to traditional instruments from the marimba and mbira family; a wide range of percussive instruments such as the West African udu clay drum, the isigaba one-stringed guitar of Botswana, the ukulele, recorder, clarinet, oboe and flute. He reads music and continuously pursues his desire for music in every form. CeeJay’s long-term dream is to find, learn and teach these instruments to people from disadvantaged backgrounds – like his own – for whom formal training in music schools and academies are far out of reach. And he is already ‘paying forward’ by learning and sharing in the same way he was nurtured by Mr Gara, who has been teaching young musicians for many years.
CeeJay’s hunger for music has led him, through hard work, to play on the same stages as many top Zimbabwean artists including Oliver Mtukudzi, Prudence Katomeni-Mbofana, Orthnell ‘Mangoma’ Moyo, Jeys Marabini, Dudu Manhenga, Sandra Ndebele, Mzoe 7, Sibusiso Harvey, ‘The Band with No Name’, ‘Stango’ lo Nongoma, Owen Maseko, and the list goes on.

He has performed at Bulawayo’s annual Intwasa Arts Festival and Ibumba Festival, for the opening of Bluez Café and the Bulawayo Arts Awards launch, and at Harare International Festival of the Arts (HIFA). In May 2017 he led the band that supported the play ‘Tellers, The Musical’, which performed in Bulawayo and Harare to much acclaim.