THERE is a certain playfulness that comes with spending time in a room with singer Wanda Baloyi.
She may have arrived for our interview dressed like a trendsetter, but once she was comfortable, the “lady” persona went out the window.
You could tell that her inner self still dominates her personality and, although she has been in the industry for “50 years” – as she put it to signify a long time – she still treated the interview as if it were her first. The excitement she displayed during the photoshoot was akin to that of a kid in a candy store, and as we became more acquainted, it showed that this was part of her “Wanda-ful” personality.
Throughout our hour-long chat, if she wasn’t beaming her infectious smile, she was breaking into song. If you’ve got it, flaunt it, they say, yet hers wasn’t the egotistical type of showing off. She is just a playful individual with immense talent.
Her latest offering, Love & Life, is her fourth album, yet she feels she is only scratching the surface. To her it’s her most personal yet as it is scripted from the experiences she has gone through in her short life.
“I named it Love & Life because I am a ‘love love’ person. I love giving and receiving love. For me, love is a remedy for everything. I’m in love with life.
“Basically, this project is a personal album, so whatever I am speaking about, it comes from my life, my experiences and my relationships,” she said.
For the people who know her closely, the stories on this album are an open book, so much so that they can almost tell who the subject of a song might be.
“It’s still very poetic and musical and not as raw as you would expect, but listening to the lyrical content you get an idea of what I am really talking about.
“Some people who have already heard the album say it is beautiful to open myself up that way to the world.
“I felt that if I was less true to myself the music wouldn’t have been as real. It also makes more sense to me on the stage when I am performing songs that are personal to me,” she said, before she broke into a short improvised song.
“I am happy that I did this project. It is truly a weight off my shoulders because I don’t want to sing a lie.”
While a lot of people get into the music business for the love of fame and money, for Baloyi it’s much more than that and the rewards are often invisible to the naked eye.
“Music is a release, it’s an expression of how you are feeling or how you felt and so by me taking it out there, it’s like I am healing myself.
“Although I am baring myself to the world, I am also clothing my soul, so I am healing myself,” she said.
Speaking of how she wrote her music, Baloyi said she embraced a number of songwriters, with Kabomo Vilakzi as the main producer for the album.
“He understood the project and let me lead the way throughout. I also worked with Afrotraction and RJ Benjamin and this meant in the end I penned only one song. All the other songs were my idea, but I would discuss with a songwriter how I wanted it to go and they would deliver.
“Awake, for example, is a song about being in a relationship with somebody, but the relationship is dead because of routine. So I am asleep. Then I meet somebody who wakes me up and I feel what love feels like,” she said.
Baloyi is working on a tour to promote her new album which will see her performing in Joburg, Mozambique, Durban and Cape Town during the festive season.
• Love & Life is available at all music stores nationwide.