André Marie Tala
André Marie Tala is a Cameroonian unseen singer, born on 29 October 1950 in Bandjoun (Cameroon), playing the Tchamassi (Afro Jazz).
Born on October 29, 1950 in Bandjoun, he was born to a father and mother in the West Bank of Cameroon, Tala loses his mother at the age of four and his father twelve years later. He made his first guitar based on nylon thread and tried to imitate as closely as possible the rhythms that rocked his childhood. At the age of seventeen, he succumbed to the surge of French chanson. It is the yeye era.
Of all the singers, it is Johnny Hallyday that is his preference. Influenced by these new sounds and chords, he founded his first band, the Rock Boys, with whom he performed his first compositions: the pains of work, honors your father and your mother. The success is immediate. Then followed the first contracts and concerts across Africa. The “Rock Boys” became the “Black Tigers” with a young guitarist, Sam Fan Thomas. At twenty, his meeting with Manu Dibango is decisive.
The latter advises him to turn to the French record companies. Thanks to the solidarity of the members of his family, he flew to Paris and signed a contract with Decca. Tala then composes the titles Sikati, Potaksina and especially Namala ébolo: more than one hundred thousand records sold.
Tala definitely established his notoriety in 1973 with the album Hot Koki, international success which will claim to be plagiarized by James Brown at the top of his art under the title “The Hustle”. In 1978, after four years of harsh legal battles, justice justified him and sentenced James Brown to pay him all his rights.
Moreover, in 1974, he composed the Soundtrack of the film Push-pousse of the Cameroonian director Daniel Kamwa. Comparable since his debut at Stevie Wonder because of their common handicap, blindness, André Marie Tala is an outstanding guitarist. He advocates the human values of peace, harmony and love.
His album Koungne (Love and Integration) is a message for the new African generation. There are African sounds tinted with pop, funk, rap, …, in a word the musical world of André Marie Tala.
In 2012 André Marie Talla opens a music school in Douala with the help of the group Bocom petroleum.