Following in the footsteps of Jaco Pastorius, he plays the bass guitar extremely well, but ever since his CD release
Scenes from My Life, the fans of
Richard Bona also adore his voice. The troubadour from Cameroon sings in his mother tongue Douala – one of the two hundred Cameroon dialects - and with his music full of atmosphere he manages to enchant the audience. Although the lyrics are incomprehensible, the sound and the form of the music impress the listener all the better. Besides that the self-made multi-instrumentalist/singer Bona manages to shape his songs in an extremely delicate way. The compositions are beautifully structured and varied, and the gentle, dreamy African vocals offer all kinds of colorful sounds. But again, also on the bass guitar he is an absolute virtuoso. It’s hardly a surprise that Bona toured with Joe Zawinul, that he was the bandleader for Harry Belafonte and that he performed with the Brecker Brothers. Last year his CD
Tiki was released, an album full of African and Brazilian influences.
