October 30th, 1974 30, 1974 1974, 1974, Kinshasa Zaire.

Here comes the Ali people out of the dressing room. This is an awesome bar of George Foreman

against the barley boxing skills of Muhammad Ali.

32-year-old Muhammad Ali strides through the crowd and finds his place at the center of the ring for his title fight against the reigning heavyweight champion of the world, George Foreman.

Their heavyweight title bout is considered by many to be the greatest sporting event

of all time. But what's less well known is that five weeks earlier in that very same stadium,

James Brown headlined an epic three-day-long pre-fight music festival.

This unique event brought black American musicians like B.B. King and Bill Withers to share

the same stage with Afro-Caribbean acts such as Celia Cruz and African megastars like

Miriam MacIba and Hugh Massacela.

All the biggest black artists on the planet do a concert for this fight.

It was a musical homecoming for these musicians of the diaspora.

But all this black excellence in one stadium in Zaire during a hot autumn in 1974?

How did this come to be?

Well, the two events were both orchestrated and stage managed by, believe it or not,

an African dictator, Mobutu Sesei Siku.

Mobutu was a darling of the West, tied to nationalism as a way to consolidate his power.

His full name was Incuku and Bindu Waza Banga.

Translated into English, it means,

The All-Powerful Warrior, who, because of his endurance and inflexible will to win,

goes from conquest to conquest, leaving fire in his wake.

Once the Belgian Congo, Mobutu had recristened his homeland as Zaire.

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