Congolese AfroSoul/Pop, Ethnofolk, and African Jazz artist Freed Mushaga is stepping into a deeply reflective new chapter with the release of “SAMANA,” a haunting collaboration with award-winning Belgian–Italian–Burundian spoken-word artist Joy Slam, released today, September 4, 2026.
Born and raised in Bukavu, eastern DRC, Freed has built a distinctive musical identity shaped by African storytelling, soul, jazz, folk, and contemporary global sounds, while using his artistry to explore resilience, dignity, belonging, and social transformation. On “SAMANA,” those themes take an even more introspective turn as Freed questions what it truly means to be free, authentic, and accountable for the life we choose to live.
The single also marks the beginning of a much larger artistic project that Freed is preparing, making this release more than just another song; it is a first glimpse into what could become one of the most ambitious chapters of his musical journey. In this exclusive interview, Freed Mushaga takes us behind the inspiration for “SAMANA,” his creative reunion with Joy Slam, Bukavu’s influence on his artistry, his journey across Africa and the United States, his work with JUA ASBL, and what listeners should expect next.
Question 1. “SAMANA” arrives today, September 4. What does this song mean to you personally, and why did you feel that now was the right moment to release it?
Following the release of “JE SUIS” and “JE SUIS – THE LIVE EXPERIENCE,” which were sonic and multifaceted reflections on the paradoxes of African identities, their reception, and their impact on myself and others, I believe that this song, which I recorded with Joy Slam in 2023 in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda, and Burundi, is an anthem that should resonate in everyone’s ears—not only because of its message but also because of the atmosphere it creates: calm, meditative, atmospheric. Not only because of the questions it raises but also because of the way it unites sounds, cultures, and people around a specific emotion to convey. For me, the song marks the beginning of a new era, an era in which I challenge my openness as a creative, human, and Congolese musician navigating the music world and going places with my music. The world, and especially my country, is falling apart, and with it everything it holds. As human beings, we need places and environments that allow us to pause, breathe, and reflect on the role we play as free spirits. This song means so much to me, and since I composed it, I’ve known it held something more powerful than beautiful chanting. It’s also a song to which I consciously gave an African touch: this proves that despite the theme change, I remain true to the core principles of my JE SUIS concept. Right now, I feel that we must fight for freedom while simultaneously questioning what freedom truly means to us—beyond the mere possibility of choosing between good and evil. I believe what's driving the world, or my country, crazy is the lack of reflection on freedom and how responsibly we use the freedoms we have. It means something different to be free to express oneself and lead a normal life as a human being than to be free to succumb to corruption, kill innocents for economic resources, and mortgage the fate of a people for personal gain.
Question 2: The song asks a deeply human question: What kind of life did you actually live? When you wrote or developed “SAMANA,” what were you personally confronting or reflecting on?
I was reflecting on the kind of life I am choosing to live while coming from a place where so many people are denied the basic conditions to live freely. In Congo, especially in the eastern region where I come from, conflict, displacement, and uncertainty are not distant ideas. They are part of the reality people carry every day. At the same time, my own life has taken me from Bukavu through different cities and countries in the region and beyond. That movement has given me opportunities, but it has also made me more aware of the responsibility that comes with having a voice.
“SAMANA” came from asking myself what I am doing with that voice. Am I only trying to build a career, or am I also allowing my life and my music to respond to what is happening around me? I was thinking about mortality, legacy, and responsibility, but also about whether my choices are connected to the values I speak about. The song is not a judgment of other people. It is first a question I am asking myself.
Question 3: You describe freedom not simply as having no restrictions, but as having the courage to live authentically and take responsibility for your choices. What does freedom mean to Freed Mushaga today?
Freedom means being able to remain fully myself while carrying the truth of where I come from. It means being able to move, create, speak, and imagine beyond the circumstances that shaped me, without pretending those circumstances do not exist.
For me, freedom is also responsibility. I have travelled through different spaces—from Bukavu to Nairobi, Harare, Johannesburg, Cape Town and now Madison—and each movement has expanded my understanding of what is possible. But it has also reminded me that freedom is not only personal. If I have access to platforms, relationships, or opportunities that many people around me do not have, then I have to ask how I can use them meaningfully.
I do not believe in forcing a message onto people. I believe in living honestly and creating from what genuinely transforms me. If that truth can also touch or transform someone else, then that is a meaningful form of freedom.
Question 4. “SAMANA” brings together your AfroSoul/folk sound with the spoken-word artistry of Joy Slam. You first connected back in 2022. What made you feel that Joy was the right voice to help tell this particular story?
Joy has the ability to make words feel lived rather than simply spoken. I felt that she could enter the emotional world of the song without making it feel like a political statement imposed from outside. That was important to me because “SAMANA” is connected to what is happening in Congo and my region and to the wider questions of dignity, freedom, and responsibility, but I did not want the song to become a slogan.
Joy understands how to hold complexity. She can speak about pain, hope, and human responsibility in a way that leaves space for the listener to reflect. We also share a belief that music and poetry can contribute to peace and transformation without pretending to solve everything. That shared understanding made her voice feel right for the song.
Question 5. Your collaboration with Joy feels like a meeting between music and poetry rather than a conventional feature. How did the creative process unfold between the two of you, and what did each of you bring into the record?
The process was organic and based on trust. I was developing the musical landscape from a place of reflection—thinking about movement, memory, Congo, freedom, and the kind of person I am becoming. Joy listened to that world and responded through poetry. She did not simply add words to an existing song; I believe she opened another door into its meaning, a meaning that I actually did not see at first when I composed the song.
I brought the melody, the rhythm, and the emotional atmosphere, while Joy brought a sharper verbal and poetic presence, her cultural expression and experiences. Her contribution allowed the song to breathe differently. We were not trying to explain everything or tell people what to think, but we were creating a space where the music could ask a question and the listener could meet it in their own way.
Question 6. You were born and raised in Bukavu, a city and region that has experienced conflict, displacement, and uncertainty. How has that environment shaped the way you write about freedom, dignity, identity, and belonging?
Growing up in Bukavu has made these subjects very real to me. In eastern Congo, people and I have lived through conflict and instability for generations, but they are not defined only by suffering. They also create, love, organise, dream, and continue building their lives. That complexity is important to me.
The environment shaped my awareness, but it did not determine the limits of my imagination. It taught me that dignity can exist even in difficult conditions, and that people can carry enormous pain while still creating beauty. When I write about freedom, I am thinking about people who want to move safely and freely, raise their families, express themselves, and imagine a future. I am also thinking about the responsibility of politicians or artists not to reduce Congo to the tragedy it is.
My music comes from that tension: acknowledging what is happening while refusing to let violence become a story we tell about ourselves irresponsibly.
Question 7. Your music has travelled from Bukavu to Nairobi, Harare, Johannesburg, Cape Town and now Madison, Wisconsin. How has moving through different cultures and musical spaces changed your understanding of yourself as an African artist?
Moving through these places has shown me that my identity is not something I have to defend by keeping it frozen. I can carry Bukavu with me while learning from Nairobi, Harare, Johannesburg, Cape Town, Madison, and every other place where I have shared music. Each city has given me a different way of listening and a different understanding of how artists connect with communities.
At the same time, travelling has made me more conscious of what I carry from home. When you leave, you begin to notice the details you once took for granted or even freedoms you thought you had or couldn’t make a difference —the rhythms, languages, stories, humour and ways people survive and support one another. I have learned that being an African artist is not about representing one single experience. It is about allowing the many realities of the continent to speak through your work without reducing them.
My movements have made me more open, but they have also made me more rooted.
Question 8. Your sound has been described as spiritually deep and heavy, while drawing from African Soul, Pop, folk and jazz. How would you describe the Freed Mushaga sound to someone discovering your music for the first time?
I would describe it as music rooted in African memory but open to change and exploration. It carries elements of soul, folk, jazz, African rhythms, and contemporary sounds, but I do not want to be trapped by a category. The sound changes depending on what I am living, learning, and confronting, but also who I’m collaborating with.
There is often a spiritual and reflective quality because I am interested in the questions beneath everyday life: who we are, what we carry, what we owe one another, and how we continue after difficult experiences and in ways that “speak to the soul directly”. But I also want the music to remain warm, human, and accessible. It can be heavy without being hopeless.
I use music to process what transforms me and therefore drive transformation around me. Sometimes that is what is happening in Congo, sometimes it is a personal experience, a journey, a conversation, or an encounter with another culture. I allow the experience to shape the music, and I trust listeners to find their own meaning in it, because I sing about freedom, I should also grant freedom in the way my music is seen.
Question 9. You are also deeply involved in the African music ecosystem through JUA ASBL, helping musicians from the Great Lakes Region professionalize and use music as a tool for social commitment. Where does that responsibility come from, and how do you balance being an artist with being an advocate?
It comes from seeing how much talent exists in the Great Lakes region and how often artists are expected to survive without the structures they need. There are musicians, poets, producers and cultural workers with powerful ideas, but many lack access to training, networks, equipment, professional guidance, and international platforms.
Through JUA, I try to contribute to building those bridges. I do not see it as charity. I see it as investing in an ecosystem that already has value. When artists are supported, they can create work that reflects their communities and opens new possibilities for others.
I also do not separate my artistic life from this responsibility. My advocacy is not something I attach to my music to make it look socially relevant. It comes from the same place as the music: from what I have experienced, what has transformed me, and what I believe can help transform other people. I try to speak when I have something genuine to say, and to create spaces where others can speak for themselves.
Question 10. You have received validation from artists such as Lokua Kanza and Gérald Toto and performed alongside artists from different parts of Africa and beyond. Has recognition from established musicians changed the way you see your own artistic potential?
It has encouraged me, especially because recognition from artists I respect feels different from external approval. When people like Lokua Kanza or Gérald Toto see something in your work, it reminds you that a voice from Bukavu can enter wider conversations without losing its identity.
But it has also made me more responsible. Recognition does not mean that you have arrived. It means that people are listening, and that you have to continue working honestly. I do not want to imitate the artists who inspire me. I want to learn from their discipline and courage while continuing to discover my own language.
Performing and collaborating across the region has also shown me that connection is possible even when our histories and contexts are different. Music gives us a way to meet without pretending that our differences do not matter.
Question 11. “SAMANA” is being presented as the beginning of something much bigger. Without giving away what you want to keep under wraps, what can listeners expect from the larger project that this single introduces?
Listeners can expect a project shaped by mobility, exchange, and reflection- things I value a lot and that have taken me this far. It grows from my experience as an artist from Bukavu who has travelled through different African cities and is now engaging with wider international spaces. Those movements have brought me into contact with artists, sounds and ideas that have changed me.
The larger project will continue exploring freedom, identity, responsibility and the ways people remain connected across borders. It will include different voices and collaborations, but the purpose is not simply to gather names or create something international for its own sake. I want each collaboration to come from a real artistic and human connection.
“SAMANA” is the first window into that world. It introduces the questions, but it does not try to answer them all.
Question 12. Your previous project, “JE SUIS The Live Experience,” explored contemporary African identity through live instrumentation, poetry and Afro-Jazz. Is “SAMANA” a continuation of that conversation, or are we entering a completely different chapter of your artistry?
It is a continuation, but it is also a deepening. JE SUIS was about identity—about asking who we are as contemporary Africans and how we carry our histories while creating something new. “SAMANA” takes that conversation into questions of freedom, mortality, responsibility, and the life we choose to live.
The difference is that I am now writing from a wider movement through the world. I am still connected to Bukavu and Congo, but I am also shaped by the people and places I have encountered across the region and beyond. That has changed the scale of the questions I ask.
The music is evolving because I am evolving. I am not trying to repeat what I have already done. I am allowing each experience to transform me and trusting that transformation to appear in the work.
Question 13. As an independent African artist building internationally, what do you think the global music industry still misunderstands about artists from places like the Great Lakes Region and the wider African continent?
The industry often sees African artists through geography before seeing us through our artistry. When an artist comes from eastern Congo, people may immediately expect a story about conflict, suffering or survival. Those realities matter, but they are not the whole of who we are.
Artists from the Great Lakes region are also thinkers, composers, producers, performers, organisers and experimenters. We are creating music that can be intimate, spiritual, political, joyful, abstract or completely unexpected. Our work should not have to explain Congo before it is allowed to be heard as art.
I also think the industry sometimes expects artists to perform a certain kind of social relevance—to make their message obvious or to speak in ways that fit outside expectations. For me, social relevance comes from honesty. I use my voice for what is meaningful to me and for what genuinely transforms me. I do not want to force a message onto people. I want to create work that opens a space for reflection, connection, and perhaps transformation.
Question 14. If “SAMANA” could leave listeners with just one thought after they press play, what would you want that thought to be?
I would want them to pause and ask themselves what they are doing with the life and freedom they have.
For someone in Congo, that question may come from a very difficult reality. For someone elsewhere, it may come from a different kind of struggle. The circumstances are not the same, but the question can still connect us. I hope the song encourages people to look at their choices, their relationships, and their responsibility to others—not with guilt, but with honesty.
Question 15. Finally, Freed, when people look back at your journey years from now—from Bukavu to the world—what do you hope they will say you stood for, beyond the music?
I hope they say I stood for dignity, freedom, connection, and possibility. That I came from Bukavu and carried the reality of Congo with me without allowing the world to reduce me or my people to conflict. That I travelled, learned from different places, and remained connected to where I began.
I hope they say I used my voice when something was socially relevant to me, but that I never forced myself or others into a message. I allowed life, movement, relationships, and experience to transform the work. And if that work transformed other people in return, then I will feel that I lived according to what I believed.
Beyond the music, I hope I helped create space—for artists from the Great Lakes region, for people whose stories are often ignored, and for anyone who needs to believe that their circumstances do not have to define the limits of their future.
As Freed Mushaga continues to push the boundaries of African Soul, Ethnofolk and African Jazz, “SAMANA” arrives as both a song and a statement of intent. It captures an artist unafraid to look inward while using his music to engage with much larger questions about freedom, identity, responsibility and the human experience. With Joy Slam adding a powerful spoken-word dimension to the record, the single opens a new chapter in Freed’s evolving story one that stretches from the realities of Bukavu to an increasingly global stage. As he prepares to unveil his next major project, “SAMANA” leaves listeners with one question worth carrying beyond the music: if freedom is the ability to live authentically, what will you choose to do with yours?
