Liaba

1978 is an approximate date, but ‘Liaba’ must have been written in the last years of Mohapeloa’s life (1908-1982) for it was found in his former office in the National Teacher’s Training College of Lesotho, where he taught in 1978-81 after retiring from Morija Printing Works. There are two very similar songs, ‘Sechaba se Kopanè’ (JPM140) and ‘Chaba se Kopane!’ (JPM129), but each version has sufficient differences to make it a different song in this critical edition. ‘Liaba’ seems to be the last-made, and even while the text ostensibly praises Prime Minister Leabua Jonathan it subtly praises the composer himself, by using his nickname, ‘Liaba’ (‘Wonders’; pers. comm. Dr Eric Lekhanya) . Unlike ‘Chaba’ and ‘Sechaba’, the manuscript of ‘Liaba’ is headed with a tempo and the words, ‘In seakhi Time’. Only one other song by Mohapeloa has this meter, ‘Mokhotlong’ (JPM114, 1972). Next to these words is a conducting pattern indicating that the song should be conducted as 3+3+2 units in a bar, the meter in which the song is transcribed here.