DIUDONNE,BIZIMUNGU
INZOVU Y'IMIRINDI - LP

UPC: 850024931893
Label: MISSISSIPPI RECORDS
Format: LP
Release Date: November 14, 2025
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In the late 1980s, singer Bizimungu Diudonne, his wife Agnes Umbibizi, and a backing band of family and friends
self-released a visionary cassette, featuring stuttering electric guitars, loping bass lines, and call and response vocals.
Their combo of 80s studio wizardry rooted in traditional Rwandan praise songs resulted in hypnotic, extended jams unlike anything else released in East Africa at the time. The lyrics praised the beauty of the countryside and the exploits of the ancient gods. On plaintive acoustic tracks squeezed between the electric bangers, Bizimungu and Agnes called for unity in the divided nation.
Their message was an eerie presaging of the coming Rwandan Genocide, which tragically tooke the lives of all
members of the group. Bizimungu and Agnes were both killed by Hutu militias in 1994. Their music, popular across
the region, was largely forgotten in the ensuing decades.
We first heard this album through music scholar Matthew Lavoie in 2018, and spent years looking for any surviving members of the band. Last year, co-producer and Voice of America host Jackson Mvunganyi tracked down Bizimungu and Agnes’ daughter, Noella, in Kigali. Only 8 years old at the time of her parents’ death, she had taken on the task of reintroducing their work to a new generation in Rwanda.
Though her family lost almost everything in the genocide, Noella miraculously was left with a CD containing the master recordings of Inzovu Y’imirindi.
It is stunning to finally hear this music in its fullness and immediacy, beautifully remastered at Osiris Studios and
pressed on the highest quality vinyl at David Rawlings’ Paramount Press. We’re grateful to Noella and our
collaborators for helping us share Bizimungu and Agnes’ vital music and message with the world.

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