For young Albert, it turned out to be the end of his own young band and the beginning of a dream come true.

"I had formed my own singing group," recalled Mazibuko in a phone interview from a hotel in Concord, N. H. "I saw Joseph in 1960 when he came with his group because it was Christmas time. They sang so beautifully. I told my group that now I was going to leave them and when I grow up I am going to join him."

Four years later Mazibuko traveled to Durban in search of Shabalala, but could not find him. But there would be a serendipitous meeting between the two five years later.

"He came to me," Mazibuko explained. "His grandmother happens to be my grandfather's sister. She sent him to me and my brother and explained to Joseph, 'These are the people who are going to help you to achieve what you wanted to achieve.'

Back then, Mazibuko could never have imagined how wide and far the dream would grow. Nearly four decades later after that fateful meeting, Ladysmith Black Mamabazo has grown into a word-wide musical sensation.

Serendipitous moment

A radio broadcast in 1970 opened the door to their first record contract, which opened the door to a discography that today includes more than 40 recordings, including their latest, "Ilembe," released just yesterday.

Another serendipitous moment occurred in the mid-'80s when Paul Simon visited South Africa in the hope of collaborating with black musicians, which led him to Ladysmith Black Mambazo's gorgeous harmonies which he incorporated into his seminal "Graceland" album. A year later, Simon produced the group's first U.S. release, "Shaka Zulu," which won a Grammy in 1988 for Best Traditional Folk Album. Since then, the group has scored eight more Grammy nominations and has worked with a wildly eclectic group of pop stars, including the likes of Stevie Wonder, Dolly Parton, Sarah McLachlan, Taj Mahal, Melissa Etheridge, Emmylou Harris, George Clinton, The Corrs, and Ben Harper.

The group's new record revisits the legacy of the legendary African warrior Shaka Zulu.

"My father used to tell me about him a lot," said Mazibuko. "He never had an excuse in his life that he was raised by a single parent, his grandmother. He never complained that he did not have both parents in his life. He believed in perfection.

"What we do, we have to do it better. By naming this album, we attribute to him that no one has to have an excuse about achieving anything. We can achieve everything if we believe in ourselves and be the best in whatever we do."

That theme surely hits home for Mazibuko, whose reality has long since surpassed the simple dream he had as a child to sing with Joseph Shabalala.

"It is like a dream," he said. "And now every time when I think about it, it feels like I am going to wake up and say that I have been dreaming. So amazing. It amazes me every day."

Bringing out the best

In Ladysmith Black Mambazo's stirring and spiritually uplifting live performances, the group strives to bring out the best in its audience, according to Mazibuko.

"We are trying to provoke whatever good things everyone has inside with our music," Mazibuko said. "Maybe we can touch some inner essence, because everyone has some good in themselves.

"When we are performing in concert we involve the audience so much. We even have a song that we sing with the audience, because we want to share the beauty we have in our music, the inspiration we get from our music."

- by Dave Madeloni