Tumeliso

Mohapeloa wrote two songs called ‘Tumeliso’ (Greetings), the first one, here, in the early 1930s, publishing it in Morija in 1935 as song No. 17 of 32 in his first song collection Meloli le Lithallere tsa Afrika I. The later ‘Tumeliso’ song no. 78 in Meloli le Lithallere tsa Afrika III (1947) was written to another text. The music of the 1935 ‘Tumeliso’ has the mood of a religious song, although it is not a hymn because it has only one verse, and the text is not overtly religious. Mohapeloa wrote few songs that have such relentless parallel thirds and melismas, which are European traits, perhaps reflecting the influence of his teachers in the mission school in Morija in the 1920s.