biographies

Big Chief Shaka Zulu

New Chief: Same Tradition…

Big Chief Shaka Zulu has been Masking for 19 years but has been a part of the African/Haitian Music Culture in New Orleans through his father Zohar Israel since he was a small child. Chief Shaka began stilt dancing from a very young age and was a part of the Skull and Bones Krewe. Currently, Chief Shaka owns an African Drum and Dance Arts Company, soon to debut an original stage production called the “Voices of Congo Square”. Chiefs first experience in the Black Masking Culture was playing drums behind Big Chief Smiley Ricks and his band “Indians of the Nation”. Chief said, “A lot of Chiefs came together for this music project that traveled to give a musical rendition of this Black Masking tradition of New Orleans”. As a youth, Chief also toured internationally with the world renown Donald Harrison Jr. as a drummer in his band “Congo Nation”.

Chief realized how sacred this culture is, when he first started inquiring about patches and how to sew. He started watching the late great Big Chief Allison “Tootie” Montana and admired the artistry and his ability to lead men. What intrigued Chief most about his early involvement with Yellow Pocahontas is that they didn’t perform. Black Masking was mainly a Secretive Street Culture which was a change from his inherited African performing culture. Although Chief Shaka was inspired to start masking by Tootie Montana who is credited with evolving the modern-day culture into one that focuses on the artistry of the ceremonial suits (the prettiest), most of his knowledge as Chief came from the tutelage and shadowing of Big Chief Darryl Montana. This sacred ancestral 168 years of history that Chief Darryl was able to impart upon Shaka was passed down from his great grandfather Becate Batiste one of the earliest recorded trailblazers of Black Masking Culture. Big Chief Darryl “Mamut” has faced and overcome many challenges to forge this culture forward. Taking this Indigenous Culture across the world and as Chief Shaka says, “retiring at the top of his game (48 years masking) with that last Blue Suit, I had to take a step back and say wow!”.

Chief Shaka has been highlighted in award-winning periodicals such as the Huffington Post, National Geographic and Data News Weekly but the breadth of Chief’s knowledge and expertise has been offered through his family’s oratory and hands-on education and Indigenous Fine Arts Gallery Golden Feather. Over the course of 8 years, through Golden Feather’s relationship with the Touring Company Road Scholar which busses retired educators and writers to New Orleans to learn about New Orleans History from a Historian and Culture Bearer, Big Chief Shaka has given lectures to well over 32,000 people.

By Glenn Jones

TRIBAL TIMELINE:

1860-1919- Big Chief Becate Batiste Krewe of Wild West

1935-1947- Big Chief Alfred Montana 8th Ward Hunters & Monogram Hunters

1945-2005- Big Chief Allison “Tootie” Montana Yellow Pocahontas Hunters

2006-2017- Big Chief Darryl “Mamut” Montana Yellow Pocahontas Hunters

2018 – Present- Big Chief Shaka Zulu Yellow Pocahontas Hunters

Marcus L. Miller

Artist/Percussionist Marcus L. Miller is a multi-instrumentalist based in Southern California. He is the Artistic Director of the performance art ensemble Freedom Jazz Movement and the bandleader of the percussion ensemble Project World Drum. He also serves as Musical Director and consultant for the modern dance company Lula Washington Dance Theatre. Miller is President of his record label Universe Soul Records and is also the founder & director of the Young Drummers of Los Angeles. Marcus is a member of Chamber Music America, a voting member of the Recording Academy, a member of American Federation of Musicians Local 47, a composer for Heavy Harmony Music publishing, and a SESAC affiliate artist.

Miller has recorded and released 14 CDs for his label and has also written music for several independent films and documentaries including Movement with a meaning, Beyond the Echo of the drum, Love and other 4 letter words, My girlfriend’s back, and the 20th Century fox DVD release of Avatar the Last Airbender.

Marcus began his professional music career in 1995. He has toured internationally & nationally performing with many groups including Ben Harper, The Watts Prophets, Sheila E., Ashanti, and BoujouBumBastick. Since 2006, he and his ensemble, the Marcus Miller Ensemble, have performed extensively with the Lula Washington Dance Theatre. This collaboration of Black American music and Black modern dance continues to redefine and reflect a unique “Black American cultural perspective”. Highlight performances include the Lincoln Center out of doors festival (2006), a six-week tour of Russia (2009), the International Book Fair festival in Guadalajara, MX (2009), a 15-city tour of China (2011), the Amazon Dance Festival in Manaus,BR (2011), the 2012 San Jose jazz festival, and a 3-week Russia/Siberia tour (2013), and a 4 night run at the Israeli Opera house in Tel Aviv (2016).

In 2015, Miller and his ensemble headlined the 12th annual Vladivostock International Jazz Festival in Vladivostock, Russia. He also started working with a group of artists called Panoply...a collaboration of musicians, dancers, poets, and graphic/visual artists to develop new technology that bridges and advances the presentation of these artistic mediums. In 2016 he started the project, M & M...the Afro-Persian Experience, along with fellow musician Mehdi Bagheri.

During the Global Pandemic of 2020-2022, Miller had the fortune of re-connecting with Big Chief Shaka Zulu. Ultimately, the two would make their debut performance in Los Angeles at the William Grant Still art center in October 2022.