Angolan writer and musician Kalaf Epalanga takes us on a journey of music and identity in his debut book, Whites Can Dance Too. Written like an anthology, three narrators give diverse perspectives of Angolan music, immigrants and its post-colonial history.
Lying alone on the hard mattress of a prison cell in Norway, the eponymous Kalaf is reflecting on the circumstances that brought him here. While on a concert tour in Norway he was arrested by the police for not having the right documents, having lost his passport in a Paris hotel.
Growing up in Luanda, the huge open-air market of Roque Santeiro and the candonguiero mini-buses were the genesis of his childhood interest in contemporary kuduro music that became a life-long passion.
When he is old enough, Kalaf takes on jobs as a builder and restaurant helper to earn money, and scours Lisbon’s clubs and music spots by night. Eventually, he achieves his dream of becoming a musician, performing all across Europe until a missing passport turns him into an illegal migrant musician.
Sophia is an anthropology student and dance teacher in Lisbon with a taste for African music and a fondness for dancing in clubs with strange men. She is also the wife-on-paper of Kalaf, a mutually agreed union to help him get the necessary documents. Sophia grew up listening to her Angolan stepfather wax lyrical about musical heroes and demonstrating dance steps.
Through a chance encounter with a Brazilian movie writer, she finds a musical soulmate and a romantic interest is sparked. Their dance-filled courtship is a further exploration of Angola’s kizomba rhythms and the blossoming of informal African cultural centres in Lisbon starting in the 1980s.
Eyvind is the Norwegian immigration police officer handling Kalaf’s case. The son and grandson of police officers, he cares little for illegal immigrants “trying to get across our borders.” Yet he spends his free time researching immigration statistics for a crime novel he intends to write and is intrigued by Kalaf’s calm boldness while in detention.
A lover of American rap musician Jay-Z, Eyvind is still in love, many years later, with Ava, neighbour and daughter of Lebanese immigrants.
This English-translated book is a vibrant introduction to Angolan literature, which is lesser-known outside of Portuguese-speaking countries.
In it, Epalanga, himself an immigrant, has penned a combination of memoir and non-fiction based on personal observations of the African diaspora. The story maps the historical roots of popular Angolan popular music during the long years of internal strife and the writing is enlivened with melodies, dance, and stories of famous bands and songwriters.
Immigrants and refugees carried the up-tempo kuduro music and relatively newer, sensual kizomba dance across borders and continents. Lisbon became the cultural melting pot that allowed niche African rhythms to evolve into global mass-consumed rhythms, interacting with musical movements from Portugal and Cape Verde, the Brazilian fado and Caribbean zouk.
Running parallel to the creative theme is the immigrant experience. Berlin-based Epalanga and many of his generation are a by-product of Angola’s civil war since independence in 1974. Between musical episodes and unforeseen cultural mergers, Epalanga discusses geopolitical circumstances that define a black man in Europe.
Asylum-seekers, racism, tightening immigration laws, detention, repatriation and refugee centres feature frequently in the narrative.
Eyvind’s story evaluates the migration from the often-hostile European perspective, with fascinating ironies such as the petroleum industry. In the 1970s an Iraqi physician and emigre in Norway was instrumental in developing the country’s successful oil sector blueprint.
Kalaf understands no boundaries or the need for them. He questions the depths to which immigrants will go to survive.
and remain in foreign countries. Far from adoring the advances of the northern hemisphere, he believes that the global south is the future of cultural shifts.
There is an essay-style feeling to the book perhaps because integration between the three stories is not entirely seamless. Nevertheless, the questions of music, migration and identity remain centred in the novel. Whites Can Dance Too was listed among the ‘100 Notable African Books of 2023’ by the African literary magazine, Brittle Paper.
