“The departmentalization of Mayotte creates a lot of problems for us” #MaParole

M'godro is a dance and rhythm typical of Mayotte, his native island. M'Toro Chamou likes to draw inspiration from the traditional music that rocked his childhood. He thus developed his own musical style, Afro m'godro blues rock. Back in Mayotte, after having lived for a long time in France and Reunion, the singer says he is concerned by the social and political situation of his island which last July sent its first National Rally deputy Anchya Bamana, the daughter of the one of the charismatic pro-French leaders of Mayotte. We met M'Toro Chamou at the beginning of June 2024 in Marseille during the La1ere festival. This issue of #MaParole was recorded in the Grenouille radio studios, at Friche de la Belle de Mai.

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1A carefree childhood

A native of Mayotte, M'Toro Chamou grew up near Dzaoudzi in a small land until he was seven years old before joining the big land in M'Tsapéré. His father was employed in a port handling company and his mother took care of her large family. The singer considers himself to belong to “a sacrificed generation” because he didn't go to school for very long. He remembers in #MaParole that day when, as a child, he saw a long line of adults forming in his village. He went to find out about them. find out the cause and then he understood that it was to enroll the children in school. His parents were not available, so he went to get the papers and took the steps on his own at the age of ten. .

Before entering school, M'Toro Chamou, as a child, spent a lot of time having fun with friends, but also participating in field work. At home, parents and family speak Shimaore. At school, on the other hand, he must speak French. It's not easy to do homework in French at home without any help. Despite everything, M'Toro Chamou has good memories of school.

At home, we listen to a lot of music, especially his father who spends a lot of time repairing radios and record players. This passion inspired M'Toro Chamou to write the song Radio Tranganika whose clip is very successful. His father has eclectic tastes. He listens to Bob Marley, African music, traditional music from Mayotte as well as French variety. His maternal grandfather plays the drum and sings chigoma. In short, the family is immersed in a very musical atmosphere.

M'Toro Chamou is the eldest of seven children. A big responsibility knowing that in Mayotte, the mother bears the name of the eldest son. “You have to watch over your little brothers and sisters as well as your mother.“, he insists. As a teenager, M'Toro Chamou became a rap, soukouss and break dancer. Dance represented his first gateway to music. Then, he created M'Tsapéré Power, the first rap group from Mayotte.

One day in M'Tsapéré, at the home of Demo, a musician neighbor of his grandmother, he saw a guitar for the first time. “It's a bit of my fundi (Editor’s note: Koranic school teacher)thanks to him, I told myself that I could make music”adds M’Toro Chamou. In Petite Terre, a musician named Slim gave him his first guitar. He joins his group as a backing vocalist. “Slim was the star in Mayotte, he was a radio host at RFO“, he remembers.

His real name Mohamed Chamsidini goes by M'Toro Chamou. “I wanted a stage name that would speak to everyone, especially the Mahorais, explains the singer. M'Toro means Brown.the rebel, the one who refuses slavery and “it is therefore a way of paying homage to them“. Chamou is the diminutive of Chamsidine which means “the sun of religion“.

In 1995, at the age of 21, the singer decided to leave Mayotte for Reunion. He deplores the lack of structures for musicians in Mayotte. “I can't talk about music without talking about Reunion, because that's where it all began.”he insists. After a year in Reunion, he arrived in France with a fierce desire to become a professional musician.

2“In Mayotte, everything is politicized”

Curiously, it was in France that he met Mikidache, one of the two musicians from Mayotte with whom he shared many projects. He went to see Baco, the other local music pioneer, in Mayotte and also learned a lot from him.

After playing with these two recognized musicians from Mayotte, he recorded his first album in 1998 entitled Come and goan album in Shimaoré, its language marked by the traditional rhythms of Mahorese music, n'goma and m'godro.

He didn't hang around, because in 1999, he signed a second album called Back to basics with a flagship title called Bomb. In this song, he denounces the way in which elected officials conduct politics in Mayotte. This title earned him a reception from Younoussou Bamana, then president of the general council of Mayotte, who looked favorably on criticism and protest by artists. “Finally a Mahorais artist who dares to speak!”he tells him.

In 2000, M'Toro Chamou met the producer of IAM, the famous Marseille rap group who advised him to plow his way by drawing on his Mahorese roots. In 2004, with his album Drink Forumit offers ballads and reggae. Like the singer Baco featured in #MaParole, he says: “I have a little bit of Bob Marley in me.”

In France, M'Toro Chamou lives successively in Marseille, Paris, Avignon and other places, but it is in Nantes that he sets down his suitcases “for love“. In 2008 and 2011, he embarked on a collective adventure with the albums Tsenga 1 and 2. Inspired by the Kassav' adventure, he said to himself that it would be good to create a collective of Mahorese singers and musicians who, like Jacob Desvarieux or Jocelyne Béroard could also record their own albums. But it didn't take on the same magnitude.

In 2011, Mayotte became 101^e French department, M'Toro Chamou is located in France. He does not look very favorably on the transformation of Mayotte where the atmosphere no longer has anything to do with the one he knew during his childhood. “It creates a lot of problems for us“, he said.

In 2012, M'Toro Chamou decided to leave France to settle in Reunion, and not Mayotte. He then criticizes his island for not investing enough in culture. Then in 2016, he recorded an important album in his career called Punk islands in which he denounces the path chosen by Mayotte. The title Humans which means “dispute“represents according to him a metaphor for this mania that “the Mahorais argue with everyone”.

In this album Punk islandsthere is a title whose clip is particularly successful called Radio Tranganika. He talks about his father and his childhood in Mayotte listening to the radio. “We didn't have a lot of money, but we lived wellhe said, we were more connected to Africa.”

M'Toro Chamou enjoys shooting music videos. The production is neat. His performance is very convincing. In Rebellious N’Godro which appears in his latest album Sika Milawe see him dressed as a king. This clip was filmed in South Africa. He was inspired by the stories of his grandmother who told him about local kings, queens, princes and princesses. “Our history is not only linked to slavery“, he emphasizes. Since the end of 2023, M'Toro Chamou has returned to Mayotte. He says that his island, which is facing numerous crises, needs him and vice versa. The singer does not doesn't see himself doing politics, but he talks about it a lot because “in Mayotte, everything is politicized”he tells us. Moreover, his music hardly escapes his maxim.

►1974

Birth in Mayotte

►2008

Album Magic 1 with Mikidache

►2015

Voice of the Indian Ocean: best Mahorean singer

►2016

Album Punk Islands

►2024

Participate in the La1ère festival in Marseille