I have always thought “authenticity” to mean something original or something that hasn’t been done before – a newness. And this has had me mull over how we can maintain originality in an era of hyper creativity, collaboration and borrowing from the old to make the new – it just seems like everything that could be new about anything had already been done. I mean there’s also a saying which goes, “there is nothing new under the sun” and so how can we be authentic? What is authenticity?
The term ‘authentic’ is used either in the strong sense of being “of undisputed origin or authorship”, or in a weaker sense of being “faithful to an original” or a “reliable, accurate representation”. To say that something is authentic is to say that it is what it professes to be, or what it is reputed to be, in origin or authorship.
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Obviously this definition leans more on the particular than it does the general – for example, another person may argue that Authenticity is “being yourself”, in which case they’d be right. But then it could also be argued that one cannot fully claim authenticity of self when we are all influenced by a vast and varied number of aspects which inform our decision making. So on this note we are going to focus on Authenticity in relation to music creation.
I can say that many artists battle with wanting to be original – wanting to be the first to introduce an idea. Musically we can point to a couple of artists who’ve been thought to be authentic, artists who’ve managed to open up the industry to introduce newer and diverse sounds. A couple of artists on my list:
- Msaki
- Umle
- Sjava
- Big Zulu
These artists have all made waves in South Africa and abroad for establishing something fresh, something that we collectively felt we hadn’t heard before. Umle successfully created a fresh sound now known as Xhosa-folk and ElectricMaskandi – you didn’t know them, right? Okay maybe you’ll be more privy to Sjava who I would say introduced a soulful and kind of trapsoul Maskandi sound into the scope and we have all been taken since. His sound has also made way for new music duo Blaq Diamond and other artists to explore our cultures sonically. So basically what these artists have done is trace themselves back to an age when music was culture- specific and they’ve opened it up so that even we can locate ourselves within different culture groups. Another great example is Big Zulu – I am not a fan of his music but I cannot ignore his contributions into the music industry, now all our friends have become overnight “Izinkabi” who fantasize about being uncanny taxi drivers – it’s amazing.
So authenticity can be two things, as per our definition:
- “of undisputed origin or authorship”
- “faithful to an original”
What this means is that you cannot call yourself a Hip Hop artist when your music is infused with, say for instance Amapiano – according to our definition here, that is not authentic because when we listen to a tape which professes to be hip hop but then we start to pick on Kwaito and/or Amapiano sounds – by nature it deviates from the nuances that make up hip hop, therefore it is not hip hop.
While Sjava introduced his very beautiful sound we can also argue that Maskandi and Soul music have existed so long that it made his process natural, we can say that he has been “faithful to an original” because when we listen to his music we hear a strong sense of Maskandi as well Rnb/soul. His understanding of both sounds works so well that when you listen to him you can’t think past him and we can say he is an authentic artist because even though he has taken from two genres – he has kept true to the nature of both genres. His singing style is very local and Zulu and his sound is international and relatable in that you could play Bryson Tiller in the same playlist as Sjava.
So according to my understanding which also influences this conclusion: authenticity in music creation is appreciating the little nuances which make up a particular sound – hip hop must sound like hip hop, its lyricism defiant by nature. Rnb must sound like rnb, we must be able to trace your steps within the scope of rnb. And should something new arise as we are also seeing a lot of cross-genre artists (myself included) – we are allowed to open up the industry to accommodate the inevitability of elasticity in music.
Otherwise, what would you say Authenticity is?
