"The Lion Sleeps Tonight" is a popular song. Originally written and composed by the South African musicianSolomon Linda in 1939, it was first published as "Mbube".[a] It made its way to the United States a decade later. In 1961, the Tokens, a doo-wop group, adapted the melody and added English lyrics to produce "The Lion Sleeps Tonight". Their version spawned many covers and featured in major films. During the 2000s, it became the subject of publicised legal conflict between Linda's family and entertainment corporations over royalty payments.
A Zulu migrant worker, Linda led the a capella group the Evening Birds. In 1939, without rehearsal, they recorded "Mbube", which fused traditional Zulu musical elements with Western influences. The recording was then released in South Africa to widespread popularity. It made Linda a local celebrity and shaped the development of the isicathamiya genre. He later sold his rights to "Mbube" to the owner of his parent record company for ten shillings,[b] unaware of what the transaction implied. The recording of "Mbube" was then sent to a record label in the U.S., and upon being unearthed, it passed onto Pete Seeger of the folk group the Weavers. They covered the song in 1951 as "Wimoweh".
A decade later, the Tokens encountered "Wimoweh" and decided to record their own version. After adapting the melody and adding English lyrics, they released "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", although Linda did not receive any credit. It topped the U.S. charts. By the mid-2000s, around 150 artists across the world had covered the song, and it had been included in the 1994 Disney film The Lion King, earning an estimated $15 million in royalties. Linda, then long deceased, was yet unrecognised for his contributions to "The Lion Sleeps Tonight". His descendants had earned very little and were left destitute. Emboldened, they filed a lawsuit against Disney for copyright violation in 2004. Within two years, they reached an out-of-court settlement with Abilene Music Company, in which the firm agreed to pay the family a lump sum for past royalties and offer them a share of future revenue.
The legacy of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" is mixed. While its global commerical success transformed it into a "truly immortal pop epiphany," its background, particularly Linda's perceived lack of recognition and fortune in his lifetime, is now deemed an example of racial exploitation. The song and Linda's story has been probed in numerous documentaries and is the part-inspiration of the 2020 film Black Is King.
Solomon Linda, born in rural Natal,[5] was a migrant worker.[6] A beer hall singer,[7] he sang in a short-lived choir named the Evening Birds, which dissolved in the mid-1930s, and soon after founded a new group under the same name. The group, comprising himself as soprano, Gilbert Madondo as alto, Boy Sibiya as tenor, and Samuel Mlangeni, Gideon Mkhize, and Owen Sikhakhane as basses,[8] performed a cappella in the weekends. It quickly grew a following.[9] After moving to Johannesburg,[9] Linda became a packer at Eric Gallo's local record-pressing plant,[10][c] the first in sub-Saharan Africa and, at the time, the only one in black Africa.[12] It was not long before the firm's talent scout noticed the Evening Birds and invited them to the recording studio.[13] Back then, record firms eyed Zulu close-harmony vocal music owing to its appeal to migrant mineworkers.[14]
The Evening Birds recorded multiple songs at Gallo's studio, and during their second session, in 1939, they achieved their breakthrough.[15] The song, "Mbube"[a], was finished without prior rehearsal after three takes.[16] Performed in four-part harmony,[17] with Mlangeni, Mkhize, and Sikhakhane on bass, Madondo and Sibiya on middle tones, and Linda on a "soaring" soprano,[18] it is sung in a call and response format: the phrases of each section overlap with each other. It follows a cyclical structure.[17] The melody contains three chords,[16] and the chord progression borrows from the marabi harmonic cycle predominant in twentieth-century South African music (I-IV-I6/4-V7-I).[17] Also featured in the recording are Peter Rezant on guitar, Emily Motsieloa on piano, and possibly Willie Gumede on banjo.[19]
Sharon LaFraniere describes the melody as "tender … almost childish in its simplicity."[20] In Rian Malan's view, "'Mbube' wasn't the most remarkable tune, but there was something terribly compelling about the underlying chant, a dense meshing of low male voices above which Linda yodeled and howled for two minutes, mostly making it up as he went along."[16] Of particular interest to commentators are the song's final few seconds,[21] where Linda breaks out into a brief howl, "a haunting skein of fifteen notes."[4] This would later become the melodic basis for "The Lion Sleeps Tonight".[21]
The lyrics, written in Zulu,[22] are said to document an episode of Linda's childhood when he chased a lion while herding cattle.[23][d]
The chorus, "wembube,"[e] is repeated throughout.[29] "Mbube" borrows strongly from Western influences introduced by missionaries and white singing troupes, among which is the four-part harmony,[18] and Veit Erlmann goes as far as to imply that the main body "displays only a few features which can be said to be rooted in traditional performance practice."[30] In fact, Linda had followed the American Virginia Jubilee Singers during his childhood.[31] These Western elements, argues Lior Phillips, "gave 'Mbube' a chance globally."[18] Erlmann notes that the song's triadic structure and harmonic progression resemble urban, Westernised genres[32] and that, on the contrary, the metrically-free introduction mirrors traditional dance music.[33] The vocal lines are intended to evoke tin whistles characteristic of South African street music.[18]
Gallo was impressed with "Mbube" and had it converted into 78 rpm records; it then aired on the rediffusion, a landline that transmitted music and news across black neighbourhoods.[15] The song achieved unprecedented success. With over 100,000 copies sold in Africa over the next nine years,[34] it is considered the first South African "hit."[35]
"Mbube" defined contemporary South African music and the isicathamiya genre,[36] which is a form of a capella choral song[37] stemming from "elements of Zulu traditional music … rehearsed and performed after hours in migrant workers' hostels"[38] along with Western, Christian influences.[39] Up until the early 1950s, the Evening Birds were the most prominent isicathamiya performers.[40] The word "mbube" also became shorthand for male a cappella choral singing in South Africa[41][g] and lent its name to a distinct music style. This style, notes David B. Coplan, "appealed across the class spectrum, melodised a growing African nationalism, created nostalgia for a lost society, and fused urban and rural values."[42] According to Erlmann, "Mbube" became "canonic for an entire generation of performers";[43] for instance, all subsequent South African music styles adopted its booming I-IV-V bass patterns.[43]
While the song proved a monumental success, Linda did not profit,[44] as he sold his rights to "Mbube" to Eric Gallo for ten shillings[45][b] just after the recording session.[46] Seeing that Linda could not read[20] and had no understanding of royalties,[47] this deal was later deemed unfair.[48] Gallo also paid Linda the equivalent of $2 for the first run of a few hundred records.[18]
"Mbube" made Linda "a legend in the Zulu subculture," and his band went on to dominate all-night song competitions.[49] The Evening Birds continued performing until 1948,[42] remaining prominent till their dying days.[50] However, Linda would never attain wealth or fortune. He lived "with barely a stick of furniture, sleeping on a dirt floor carpeted with cow dung," and malnutrition took the life of one of his children.[20] In 1959, Linda collapsed onstage, which doctors ruled a result of kidney failure.[51] He died three years later aged 53.[52] At the time of his death, his bank account contained roughly $40 in today's money.[53][h] His family could not afford a tombstone.[56]
Pete Seeger of the Weavers, who, in 1951, covered "Mbube" and thus popularised the tune in the United States
Some years later, Gallo sent a bundle of records to Decca Records in the United States.[57] They were about to be discarded before a Decca employee, Alan Lomax, salvaged them; among these records was "Mbube". He then handed the box over to folk singer Pete Seeger of the Weavers.[58] A penniless banjo player, Seeger had entered the music scene after quitting university and accustoming himself with popular songs of the Great Depression.[59] He was fascinated with "Mbube"[58] and promptly transcribed it "word for word,"[60] although he misheard the chorus as "wimoweh."[61] In December 1951,[62] the Weavers released a cover of "Mbube" named "Wimoweh", which, as Malan writes, "was faithful to the Zulu original in almost all respects save for the finger-popping rhythm."[63] Seeger later remarked that "Wimoweh" was "just about my favorite song to sing for the next forty years."[58]
Shortly after its release, Gallo sold "Mbube" to The Richmond Organization in exchange for the rights to administer "Wimoweh" in some bush territories.[46] Songwriting credits were given to the fictitious "Paul Campbell," a tactic enabling the Weavers to claim royalties on songs from the public domain, even if "Mbube" was not in the public domain.[64] Such a practice was common at the time.[65] Royalties for "Wimoweh" were split two ways: half went to the Weavers' publishers—Howard Richmond (of The Richmond Organization) and Albert Brackman—and their manager, Pete Kameron, and the other half to the Weavers.[66] None went to Linda.[64]
George David Weiss, who arranged the melody and lyrics of "Wimoweh" into "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" in 1961
Malan writes that by the end of the 1950s, "almost everyone in America knew the basic refrain" of "Wimoweh".[70] After hearing a live Weavers performance of the song,[71][i] the Tokens, a teen doo-wop group from Brooklyn, decided to record their own version.[73] They had already attained a hit, "Tonight I Fell in Love", and signed up with RCA for a three-record contract effectively commencing in 1961.[74] While their first two records struggled, the third would bear fruit.[75]
For their third attempt,[75] the Tokens approached the musician George David Weiss and solicited an overhaul of "Wimoweh", to "give it some intelligible lyrics and a contemporary feel."[72] He purged the song of its shrieks and hollers, while leaving the chant unchanged,[72] and made Linda's final improvised notes the new tune.[21] 33 words were added as English lyrics,[76] beginning with, "In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleeps tonight."[77] The Tokens then recorded Weiss' version, with Jay Siegel performing falsettos, the rest of the band chanting "wimoweh," and the guest opera singer Anita Darian "[diving] in the high heavens" with her "haunting" countermelodies.[76] Accompanying them were an orchestra, a percussionist on timpani, and session musicians on guitar, drums and bass.[76]Hugo Peretti and Luigi Creatore produced the piece.[75] Ultimately, the Tokens were not particularly enthralled with "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", and it was released in October 1961[78] as a B-side.[76]
While the A-side, "Tina", flopped,[76] "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" surged to No. 1 in the U.S. charts[50] and in numerous other countries.[7] Many covers of the song found similar success in the years to come,[4] including Karl Denver's, which reached No. 4 in the UK in 1962,[79]Robert John's, which rose to No. 3 in the US a decade later,[80] and Tight Fit's, which topped the UK charts in 1982.[81] French and Japanese covers also achieved chart success in the 1990s,[82] and Miriam Makeba performed it at President John F. Kennedy's birthday.[83] According to Marti Smiley Childs and Jeff March, "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" was the first African song to top the U.S. charts.[75] The Tokens subsequently became music producers, and while their fame as performers waned—only managing to land their next top 40 U.S. single four years later—they fluorished in their new role. Among their productions was the Chiffons' "He's So Fine", a No. 1 hit.[75]
In 1994, "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" rose to the spotlight when it featured in the Disney film The Lion King.[84] The film would gross nearly $1 billion[18] and produce many soundtrack CDs.[85] It was also included in the 1997 staged musical of the same name,[47] which remains the highest-grossingBroadway show of all time.[18] By the mid-2000s, "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" had been recorded by over 150 artists worldwide[86] and had a role in more than thirteen movies.[20]
Following the song's renewed commerical fortune,[71] in 2000, the South African journalist Rian Malan penned an essay for Rolling Stone which shed light on the origins of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight".[77] He told the story of "Mbube", its eventual rise to international success, and the struggles faced by Linda's daughters,[87] and concluded that "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" had earned some $15 million in royalties.[88] Two years later, fellow South African François Verster composed a documentary about Linda and "Mbube", A Lion's Trail.[89] In Håvard Ovesen and Adam Haupt's words, it "seeks to obtain justice for a man marginalised by his status as a black African musician in a racist and exploitative environment."[90] Both Malan's essay and Verster's documentary publicised Linda's story greatly.[17]
Conflict over songwriting credits and royalty payments has engulfed "Wimoweh" and "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" ever since their release. The earliest dispute dates to c.1951. Upon learning that Linda was not to be granted any songwriting royalties, Seeger objected, insisting that Linda, as the "true" author of "Wimoweh", should receive his due. He directed his publisher to send Linda the royalties, at one point dispatching a $1,000 check himself,[91] but Linda's daughters later denied that consistent payments for "Wimoweh" had been sent made since the 1950s.[92] Nonetheless, Seeger eventually stated that "I never got author’s royalties on 'Wimoweh'. … I assumed [the song's publishers] were keeping the publisher’s fifty percent and sending the rest."[93] In 1971, The Richmond Organization acknowledged that the song was based on "Mbube", and since then, Linda's family has received royalty payments totalling 12.5 percent of "Wimoweh"'s overall earnings.[67]
The next dispute concerned the Tokens' revision. Peretti, Creatore, and Weiss credited "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" solely to themselves, thinking that the Weavers' tune was based on traditional African music and thus could not be copyrighted, but this was not the case.[93] As the song was achieving widespread success, Howard Richmond insisted that the trio cede publishing rights back to the Weavers. They complied, and the Tokens retained full songwriting credits.[51]
However, the conflict was still unresolved. In 1989, the copyright on "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" was about to expire, and Weiss demanded Richmond and Brackman pay him and his fellow songwriters a generous bonus, lest he renew the song's copyright without crediting them at all. Richmond and Brackman accused Weiss' team of plagiarising the Weavers' 'original' recording, but they retorted that they had received permission to adapt the song in 1961.[94] The dispute made its way to court a year later.[95] Here, litigants representing the Richmond Organization argued that the 1961 permission was "inaccurate" and attempted to expose Weiss for adapting Linda's "Mbube" without making due payments to Linda's family.[96] The court eventually ruled in favour of Weiss' team,[97] with Judge John Keenan declaring their adaptation of "Wimoweh" a separate composition.[98] While Weiss' team retained rights over "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", the court ordered that they send ten percent of performance royalties—profits made whenever the composition was broadcast[99]—to Linda's family.[82]
Linda had no legal rights as a black South African, in the pre-apartheid years of segregation. However, by the time Linda’s family filed a lawsuit, apartheid had been abolished, and South Africa had become a democratic nation.[100]
In July 2004, as a result of the publicity generated by Malan's article and the subsequent documentary, the song became the subject of a lawsuit between Linda's estate and Disney, claiming that the latter owed $1.6 million in royalties for the use of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" in the film and musical stage productions of The Lion King. At the same time, the Richmond Organization began to pay $3,000 annually to Linda's estate. In February 2006, the South African singer's descendants reached a legal settlement with Abilene Music Publishers, who held the worldwide rights and had licensed the song to Disney, to place the earnings of the song in a trust.[101]
In 2012, "Mbube" fell into the public domain in South Africa.
A Zulu on the far side of the planet writes a 13-note melody that flies off and takes root in the brain of a radical American folksinger who turns it into 'Wimoweh,' which in turn gives birth to 'The Lion Sleeps Tonight,' which goes through about 12 hit cycles over the next 60 years. … I love that part of the story, the improbable cultural transfers and misunderstandings, the strange musical mutations, the rich mix of characters … But that’s a story about music. The parallel story about money has been less inspiring.
"The Lion Sleeps Tonight" is one of the most commercially successful pop songs in history[89] and according to Malan, the most famous melody born in Africa.[103] It has been recorded by well over a hundred artists around the world:[86]Glen Campbell, Brian Eno, R.E.M., Bert Kaempfert,[4]Yma Sumac,[14] among others. More than thirteen movies sample it.[20] Malan additionally describes "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" as a "truly immortal pop epiphany."[4]
However, its legacy is more complicated. Because of the copyright issues surrounding it, David Browne and Simon Robinson deem "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" one of pop music's most contentious tunes.[104] The song's association with long-running racial and, in Ovesen and Haupt's view, capitalist,[90] exploitation has been discussed in several articles and papers.[105] Malan likens Linda's story of perceived injustice with that of other black musicians such as Lead Belly, who "lost half of his publishing to his white 'patrons.'"[106]
Some scholars parallel the family's legal victory and eventual recognition of Linda's efforts with South Africa's transition away from apartheid and into democracy.[107] According to Carol A. Muller, "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" "[opened] the doors to South African music and musicians abroad in the twentieth century," as displayed by Paul Simon's 1986 album Graceland, which incorporates elements from isicathamiya.[17] On the contrary, Ovesen and Haupt's view is more nuanced. They contend that, while justice ultimately seems to have been served for Linda, "the power structures that enable the continuation of huge socio-economic disparities are still in place."[108]
The story of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" and the plight of Linda’s daughters have been chronicled. Beyond Malan's essay and Vester's documentary,[89] they were covered in the 2019 Netflix film ReMastered: The Lion’s Share.[109] Moreover, Beyoncé's 2020 musical film Black Is King partially came into being after she learned of how Linda was not recognised for his contributions to "The Lion Sleeps Tonight". In the film, the original "Mbube" rather than the Tokens' version is featured.[110]
1 2 Ten shillings in 1939 is worth $70 in 2025 (a shilling then being a twentieth of a pound, and a pound being worth $140.97 in 2025, the latter value was halved and rounded down).[3]
↑ Rian Malan suggests that Linda was given the job at Gallo's firm after recording "Mbube", not before.[11]
↑ Malan presents a slightly different interpretation: that the lyrics refer to an lion-hunting incident in the Evening Birds' collective memory, not just in Linda's.[16] Veit Erlmann follows a similar lyrical interpretation but argues that "Mbube" was based on an older wedding song, in the same vein as many early isicathamiya songs.[24]
1 2 Some sources indicate "uyimbube" instead of "wembube,"[27] and one indicates "uyimbube-wo."[28]
↑ Sources which write "uyimbube" instead of "wembube" translate it as "you're a lion."[25]
↑ According to David B. Coplan, the ingoma busuku style adopted the name "mbube" after the song's release.[42]
↑ Different figures are suggested. Sharon Lafraniere writes that Linda died with $22 in his account,[20] worth $35.08 in 2025,[54] but Simon Robinson denotes $25,[55] worth $42.54.[54]
↑ According to Malan, the Tokens came across the song on a Weavers album. They then contacted the South African consulate, which jokingly described "Mbube" a "Zulu hunting song" about "eating lions."[72]
↑ Sales and streaming figures are based on certification alone.
1 2 3 Shipments figures are based on certification alone.
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