The Congo He Saw

It is our pleasure to have Cianga Gracia grace our airwaves with a new sonic work made for STANDING IN THE CRACKS OF MULTIPLE HISTORIES, a year after having been in residency with us in Berlin.

The Congo He Saw is a sound piece composed of four movements, telling the untold story of Congo’s independence; the country Patrice Lumumba saw across the river, the day of his assassination. The piece is not any more about him. Rather, it is a sound memorial for the potential of 1960s Congo – a spectral archive of futures interrupted, and voices made to echo through absence. The piece moves through each movement, blending experimental music, field textures, poetry, and archival fragments, to conjure a Congo fighting to find form after centuries of colonial violence.

The piece does not attempt to explain history. It unsettles it. It contemplates how colonialism dismembers – not just bodies and geographies – but also time, rhythm, and memory. The tooth of Lumumba, removed and kept as a souvenir by a Belgian officer, returned only in 2022, becomes both metaphor and relic: a grotesque stand-in for everything that was stolen and withheld. It is also a stark reminder of how present all of this history is – there are still those alive who have stolen without reproach.

Through The Congo He Saw, Cianga asks: What is true about 1960s Congo? After the colonial powers, before dictators; a healing and pained land. In this way, the piece listens more than it tells. It listens to rage, to water, to mourning, to the haunted joy that survives through dance. It listens for Lumumba’s words – not as quotes frozen in time, but as rhythms that pulse a life that can still be felt today.

In the final movement of the piece is the line from Lumumba’s speech at Congo’s first Independence day: “... our glorious history of our fight for freedom.” That phrase fractures – becoming chant, song, drum, rupture. It multiplies. It refuses closure.

The Congo He Saw is a descent into dissonance, but also a rising toward another kind of historical clarity, one rooted in sound, sensation, and the refusal to forget.

Walkthrough
I. Last walk to the river [0:00–10:58]
 A. To the Water [0:00–6:50]
 B. The Anger of Man [6:51–8:12]
 C. My Soul, at ease [8:13–10:58]

II. Elegy [10:59–22:30]
 A. for his tooth [10:59–15:59]
 B. etymology [16:00–17:48]
 C. hunt [17:49–22:34]

III. A tender, stubborn Congo [22:35–40:21]
 A. to sing while your country is ablaze [22:35–29:19]
 B. portrait of a black dancer [29:20–31:20]
 C. my ancestor’s best outcome [31:22–35:15]
 D. okra [35:15–36:48]
 E. congo, seen the heavens [36:49–38:32]
 F. city of fire [38:33–40:20]
 G. the purpose of my teeth [40:21–41:15]

IV. Glorious History [41:16–end]

Credits
Composed, written, and mastered by Cianga
With special thanks to: Lorenzo Buffa and Bruno Dela Rosa (Bass); Soo Yeon Lyuh Haegum player (Haegum); M’Bemba Bagoura (Djembe); Amada from Closegood (production and creative direction)
Featuring excerpts from Patrice Lumumba’s speech on 30 June 1960, to christen a new, independent Congo.