Siti binti Saad (1880– August 1950) was a pioneering Tanzanian musician in the taarab musical style. Through her music she was also an anti-colonial activist, feminist and Swahili cultural icon of 20th century. She produced over 250 phonograph records throughout her lifetime, becoming the first East African vocalist to release commercial recordings in the 1920s and 1930s. She also added a brand-new dance and pantomime component to taarab music called "natiki," which was inspired by Indian dance. She was a trailblazer as a female performer in the genre during a time when men artists controlled the industry. She performed in a variety of languages, but most significantly in Swahili, in contrast to earlier vocalists who solely sang in Arabic. She sang in cities of the coast of Tanganyika and Zanzibar.
Her musical career peaked between 1928 and 1939, but she continued to perform until her death in 1950. More female performers started appearing in the previously all-male singing clubs after she died. Taarab began to be performed more frequently in Swahili than in Arabic.Suleiman, A A 1969 "The Swahili singing star Siti binti Saad." Swahili 39,1:87-90
Early life Siti binti Saad was born into slavery in the village of Fumba, Zanzibar sometime around the year 1880. Her given name, Mtumwa, which translates to "slave" or "servant," emphasizes the lowly position into which she was born.
Her father, Saadi, was a Nyamwezi of Tabora, and her mother was from the Zigua of Tanga. Both parents were born in Zanzibar to enslaved families, and they worked on clove plantations and in the creation of fine pottery. Siti disappointed her parents by not being able to master pottery like her mother, but she sold her mother's work in their town. Zanzibar's population was thought to be made up of roughly three-fourths slaves or recently manumitted slaves in 1895, the majority of whom worked on clove plantations owned by the island's Omani (Wamanga, in Swahili) elite.Sheikh-Hashim, Leila 1988 "Sitis's magnetic voice" Sauti ya Siti I, I :3-4Khatib, M S 1992. Taarab Zanzibw Dares Salaam: Tanzania Publishing House
Following the passing of an abolition law in Zanzibar in 1897, freed slaves progressively ceased to be considered socially dependent individuals and started to call for acceptance into island society as autonomous individuals. Siti's personal life story echoes many of the most significant changes that took place at this time.
Early career Mtumwa binti Saadi relocated to Zanzibar Town in 1911, fourteen years after the abolition of slavery, in quest of better employment possibilities, more personal freedom, and a place to start over in life. Siti relocated to a section of the town known as Ng'ambo (literally, "the other side"in Swahili), which was formerly the neighborhood of the urban enslaved and was separated from Stone Town, where the lavish stone homes of the Arab, Asian, and European ruling families were situated, by a tidal creek. The population of Ng'ambo more than doubled between 1890 and 1930 as tens of thousands of people, including Siti, left the rural plantations and relocated to the city. Mtumwa binti Saadi, however, left the rural plantations and settled in a town.
Mtumwa binti Saadi and others quickly learned, however, that despite the town's limited chances for increased autonomy, prior systems of class, ethnic, and gender oppression continued to shape their lives fundamentally. Siti's reputation as a performer started to spread throughout Ng'ambo during World War I. Her ability to portray the joys and tragedies of daily life in Ng' ambo through song, as well as her determination to use her performance to denounce acts of injustice that her friends and neighbors were exposed to, were the foundations of her success. The gossip and arguments happening in the neighborhood where Siti and the other band members lived, worked, and played often found their way into songs. Both the music of Siti's band and the daily lives of the people of Ng'ambo were replete with poverty, the conceited superiority of the ruling class, and the abuses of British colonial tribunals.
Although written versions of Siti's life history frequently portray her as transcending her impoverished background—an icon reflecting the realised hopes of an entire generation—while she is widely hailed by her contemporaries for never forgetting where she came from, Mtumwa, the daughter of rural slaves, rose to fame in the 1920s under the name "Siti" which has a double meaning of both "lady" and "fife/whistle". She frequently sang religious and secular songs at the weddings and festivals of the prominent families of Swahili coast of Tanzania during this time, which helped her become well-known outside of Ng'ambo. No ceremony was judged successful, be it a wedding or the celebration of a birth, among Zanzibar's elite, without Siti's performance, according to one author. They received many invitations, especially from the Sultan and the Omani Arab elites, and to perform at various weddings and other celebrations.
Since at that time, education for female children wasn't taken seriously, Siti wasn't able to go to school or attend Madarasa Koranic studies. She had the fortune to meet a member of the taarab group Nadi Ikhwani Safa named Ali Muhsin. At that time, Nadi Ikhwani Safa was the only taarab group founded by Sultan Barghash bin Said of Zanzibar, who loved comfort and luxury. It was an all-male group, as it was seen as indecent for women to join musical groups. Lord Muhsin volunteered to teach Siti to sing, accompanying musical instruments, and Arabic. He then introduced her to the other members of Nadi Ikhwani Safa who without hesitation began to organize various performances for her in the community.
Although the Zanzibari aristocracy may have perceived her role at these festivities as that of the singing slave girl, in the written folklore she is praised for mixing with the most prominent figures in Swahili culture. Most Ng'ambo community members' financial incentives for these performances were much beyond their expectations. She got gifts of silks, embroidered clothing, and gold jewellery, and the payment she received for one performance for these affluent guests was more than what the average urban worker would make in a year.
Recordings Siti's inclusion in the elite and her increasing riches exemplified the era's capacity for change. When she was selected in 1928 to be the first artist from East Africa to make a phonograph recording, her stature as a cultural icon was furthered. Up until the late 1920s, the only commercial recordings offered in East Africa were in Middle Eastern, European, and Indian languages. The Gramophone Company delegated responsibility for the growth of the East African market to its Bombay branch. Asian local dealers were chosen to represent, sell, and promote both gramophones and phonograph discs.
Abdulkarim Hakim Khan, His Master's Voice representative in Zanzibar, encouraged the firm to risk on the creation of Kiswahili records in 1928 and arranged for Siti and the other band members Budda Swedi, Maalim Shaaban, and Mbaruk Alsam to fly to Bombay to record. In the following several years, albums targeted at hitherto untapped markets were promoted globally as international recording corporations began to cautiously recognise the potential purchasing power of black listeners.
Overwhelmed by their initial success—especially in light of the pitiful Rs 64 (roughly TZS 100 at the time) that had been spent to advertise and promote these first recordings—His Master's Voice invited Siti and her band back to Bombay for another session in March 1929. The 56 songs (28 records) from Siti's first session sold over 23,000 copies by 1931. The group recorded 98 more songs during this second tour, which went on to sell 40,666 copies over the following two years. Other recording firms decided to imitate His Master's Voice's explosive growth in East Africa in terms of both sales and earnings.
His Master's Voice, Odeon, Columbia, and Pathe had all begun recording in East Africa by 1930. Although the downturn and increased competition caused His Master's Voice's sales to decline significantly in 1931, by mid-1931 they had sold over 72,000 records in East Africa, the vast majority of which were recordings by Siti binti Saadi and a few other Taarab performers. Given that Kiswahili is and has always been the most commonly spoken language in East Africa, it seems logical from a marketing perspective that the choice to make music recorded in that language was made. But as Wemer Graebner has claimed, colonial administrators and missionaries in East Africa, who promoted Swahili taarab as a more "developed" and "civilised" kind of music, also had a significant impact on the practises of business executives.
Over 250 songs were recorded by Siti and her band for various labels. Unsurprisingly, not all of her songs were memorable, and not all of her best songs were recorded. One hundred of these song texts were analysed, and the results showed that 20% of the band's songs dealt with social and cultural issues, 2% with religion, and 60% with love-related themes. Siti's sharp criticisms of local class and gender issues made up less than a quarter of her published works, yet they are the ones for which she is most known. There are no company records that would shed more light on the specifics of what was recorded, how the content was chosen, or whether it was subject to censorship by the firm or colonial authority.
The newly formed business, EMI, sent a representative to East Africa to look into the current situation and potential futures of gramophone promotion following the merger of His Master's Voice, Odeon, Pathe, and Columbia in 1931. The agency suggested a continuous focus on Swahili recording in his report. Siti did record some songs in Arabic, but her Swahili songs received the greatest praise. Although only the relatively well-to-do could afford to buy records, her popularity spread among East Africans of all social classes, and her records played an important role in making taarab music accessible to the general public.
Siti succeeded in elevating the status of Kiswahili and, by extension, Kiswahili speakers, by recording in the language. One man who frequently visited Siti's family when he was a young man said that these recordings stood for "The importance of Swahili as one of the most advanced African languages." He and many other Zanzibaris saw Siti's records as proof that European and Asian cultures saw them as civilised individuals, which was a major accomplishment in the colonial era of the 1930s.
Swahili cultural icon Although Siti binti Saadi's music has received praise from both oral and written sources, there are noteworthy contrasts in the focus placed on it in the two written sources. All of them emphasise the importance of her recordings, frequently designating the time when she signed her contract with His Master's Voice as the pinnacle of her career. The well-known Swahili poet Shaaban Robert described her songs as "the pride of East Africa" and her recordings as "a great light in the darkness" left for future generations. These authors note that the act of recording has the power to preserve spoken words because they are fleeting. They also gave Siti a power as a creator that oral sources did not since they were imbued with the idea of authorship authority that frequently comes with literacy.