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American musician and singer-songwriter PJ Morton pays tribute to Africa in his latest album, Cape Town to Cairo, which he created while on a 30-day trip across the continent.

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The multiple Grammy award winner produces, records and writes African American music, OkayAfrica reports. In his two decades in the music business, the New Orleans native has been able to reinvent himself, swaying between pop, R&B, funk and gospel.

The artist’s current album, Cape Town to Cairo, expands on his collaborative and imaginative approach to genre-bending music.

‘I wanted to capture the emotions that I felt while I was on the continent so I made a promise that I wouldn’t write anything before I arrived in Africa, and I wouldn’t write anything after I left – I ended up recording all my vocals before I left too,’ Morton told OkayAfrica.

‘Cape Town to Cairo is an album I created on a 30-day trip across Africa. From Cape Town and Johannesburg, South Africa to Lagos, Nigeria, to Accra, Ghana, to Cairo, Egypt, and back down to South Africa again.’

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He said all his raw thoughts and influences were put into the album, featuring R&B and soul, gospel, pop and jazz. ‘All combined with the inspiration of Africa,’ he adds.

‘We didn’t have the luxury of time to police which genres would fit where, and the origins of all this music started in Africa anyway. Cape Town to Cairo is the diaspora in music form, done my way.’

Morton wrote ‘Count on Me’ (feat. Fireboy DML) while in Cape Town. ‘I wanted to write something that could speak to the world as a whole. I feel like there’s so much negativity right now and something positive could be refreshing.’

‘This song also speaks to the power of friendship. I sat at the piano in Cape Town, South Africa and started to play the verse on the piano. While in Nigeria, I let Fireboy [DML] hear the idea and he came up with his verse right there on the spot.’

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Another song he wrote while in Cape Town is ‘Simunye (We are one) feat. Soweto Spiritual Singers’. ‘I wrote this on my second day in Africa. I was in Cape Town, South Africa, and I guess I was feeling the pride of belonging to something bigger than myself.’

‘I knew I wanted to write a call and response that felt like an anthem or a hymn. I asked my great friend Jonathan Butler if there was a local word that describes something that could be that. He gave me “Simunye”.’

‘After he gave me the word, the whole song just came right there. Also realizing all that South Africa had gone through with apartheid and the 30th Anniversary of that, it all hit me,’ he said.

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Picture: @PJMORTON / X

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