Wazimbo is a Mozambican singer associated with marrabenta, the urban dance music that emerges in Mozambique in the 1950s and becomes closely linked with the country’s independence struggle. He begins his career in the 1960s, performing with various bands in Maputo.

After Mozambique gains independence from Portugal in 1975, he works with the big band of Radio Mozambique, the national radio station. That group later becomes Orchestra Marrabenta Star de Moçambique, a band known for a fuller, more electric style of marrabenta that combines electric guitars, strong horn sections and soulful vocals.

In 1988, during a period when recording facilities are scarce in Mozambique, the band travels to Zimbabwe to record an album issued on Piranha as Independance. During those sessions, Wazimbo sings the ballad “Nwahulwana” spontaneously. The track is not used on the original album and is thought lost, but it is later rediscovered during remixing sessions in London. It goes on to reach a wider audience through use in a Microsoft commercial and in the soundtrack to Sean Penn’s film The Pledge.