While I have had no lack of wonderful life experiences, it is not often that I have had the privilege of finding myself in the presence of true greatness. I certainly did not expect to find it in a modest sound shop in the streets of Ottery, Cape Town. I will forever cherish the hour that legendary South African audiophile and accomplished sound engineer Akbar ‘Aki’ Khaan shared with me during our recent interview.

During the course of his career, Aki Khan has worked with some of the best musicians that South Africa has ever produced, become one of the most respected sound engineers in the country, and fulfilled his childhood dream of working with Yusuf “Cat” Stevens, among his many accomplishments. Despite being at the head of his own highly successful business, recognised as one of the most accomplished sound engineers in South Africa, and enjoying personal connections with some of South Africa’s most powerful political personalities, Aki remains incomparably modest and unassuming.

My short time with Aki left me feeling incredibly proud to be a South African, who gets to call men of Mr Khan’s calibre my countryman. I hope that this brief transcription of a portion of our conversation will capture a little of the magic that is Aki Khan for you too.

 

When did you first become interested in music?

Growing up in the 1970s, music was such an important thing for me – it kept one alive in the 1970s, and I have always had a passion for music. I was heavily influenced by Bob Dylan, Carole King, Joni Mitchell and David Crosby. It is amazing how things can be so serendipitous. For example, one of my friends is doing an album with David Crosby at the moment. I remember the very first time I heard “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes” by Crosby, Stills and Nash being played on a dilapidated record player while at school. It was a defining moment for me, and I have been a music and sound guy ever since.

How did you start your career in music?

I actually started my career as a teacher. As a youth, you do all this work at school, but you never really know where it is going to take you. I had some really interesting teachers, and so I decided to study education and see where it would take me.

The big change for me came in 1976 when the student uprisings started, and Hector Peterson had just been shot. There was so much suffering in the country, but the music that I was listening to was not talking about these experiences. So, a couple of buddies and me got together and started this band called ‘Old Bones’. We wanted to make our own music about our own struggles. We also wanted to make people aware of what was happening in South Africa, and music seemed like the best way to tell our stories. We also just wanted to have some fun and show the government the finger.

In 1977, when Winnie Mandela was banished to Bradford, Randy [Randolph Hartzenberg] wrote the song called Nelson Born in the Land of the Sun, which was quite a hit and became something of an anthem for the youth.  

How did you become involved in the struggle against Apartheid?

While I was teaching at Oaklands High, we put together a school band. In the mid-1980s, the students took to the streets again, and we would take part in the protest action by arriving at places where students were gathering and play songs like We are the World, and Bob Marley songs like Get Up Stand Up For Your Rights and So Much Trouble In The Land. We also played the repertoire that I grew up with as a teenager and the struggle songs that we had written.

We performed on a makeshift stage and would smuggle our equipment in through a hole in the fence because the police would set up barricades and surveillance outside the main gates. We were told: ‘If you guys go in there we are going to arrest you and put you away.’ We didn’t let that stop us though – we just made a plan. Our equipment was very rustic, for example, the PA that we were using for a crowd of 5000 people was a Marshal Amp and a box amplifier, with everything just plugged in.

Performing the Toyi-Toyi on electric guitars, bass and drums, we would have the entire student body, as many as 5000 students, mesmerised by the music and the experience. It was an incredibly special time, and it confirmed my belief in the power of music to change lives – most especially my own.

By the mid-1980, the Oaklands High Band was getting pretty famous, and soon we found ourselves brushing shoulders with some of the most important political activists of the time. We would go on stage and play freedom songs before Dr Allan Boesak, or Dullah Omar made a speech, and then the band would sing a song about the consumer boycott. Before I knew it, I had become a part of the struggle and a freedom fighter in my own way. It was a really exciting time because we had nothing – but we had each other, and we made a plan for whatever we needed. It was amazing to be a part of something like that – and to feel that we had a voice and what we had to say mattered.

 

When did you start developing your skills as a sound engineer?

I became a sound guy out of necessity more than anything else.  We needed our gear to work, and I figured out how to make that happen – and discovered that I was pretty good at it.

When the Oaklands School band rehearsed in a classroom, we sounded pretty good, but the moment that we went outdoors, performing for huge crowds we were singing through horn speakers, and it didn’t sound so cool. I knew that we could do better, so I approached a couple of guys in the industry, like Murray Anderson and Paul Bosner, and asked for help. In true South African spirit, they gave me some gear for nothing, and before I knew it, I had become a sound man.

Thanks to donations, we eventually got a pretty cool rig together, including a Fender Rhodes Piano, and old Tama Drum kit, a Roland JC 120 Jazz Chorus Amp and a bunch of microphones. We would load all of the gear into the back of our car and hit the road, going from venue to venue to perform. During the struggle, I really enjoyed being involved in all the subversive stuff, but I also created a name for myself as a sound engineer.

 

What are some of your most memorable experiences from this time?

I converted the garage at my home into a space where the band could rehearse and hang out. On Friday nights, we had a lot of politicians, activists and people in hiding that would come around to hang out and have a good time in our little cul-de-sac in Crawford, Cape Town.

We started up the Cultural Collective, with people giving guitar lessons, writing subversive songs and holding music workshops. People would go on playing until two in the morning, and the entire neighbourhood would go mad. We didn’t have access to any high-end sound treatment, so we took egg boxes and stuck them to the walls. I was still always in trouble with the neighbours because, in my twenties, I didn’t really understand that egg boxes don’t work very well as sound-proofing.

In 1990, when Nelson Mandela was released from prison, I was involved in getting the sound set up at the Cape Town City Hall, where Madiba gave his first public address and set in motion the dismantling of Apartheid. I was supposed to be the guy to hold the mic for Mr Mandela, but it didn’t work out that way. It was still one of the most memorable days of my life.

 

How has being a part of the struggle against Apartheid shaped you?

What the struggle taught me was that you can be anything that you want to be. Nothing is too big or too small. Basically, in those days, we had no money. All we had was a fierce vision and a dream. We discovered that you can do anything with nothing, and that every individual has the ability to change the world. We had a say and a voice. Whatever we had, like MacGyver, we would make it work. That is what we did, and it has been one of the guiding principles that I have followed my whole life.

After the fall of Apartheid, Khan began working as a sound engineer in theatre, with some of South Africa’s most influential producers and directors, including Pieter Toerien and David Kramer. His part-time passion became his full-time career when his wife handed in his resignation to the Department of Education in the mid-1990, freeing Akbar to pursue his career as a sound engineer, full time. During this time, Khan established Eastern Acoustics, a Cape Town-based audio-visual company that specialises in both large and small-scale conferences, theatre, concerts and festivals. Eastern Acoustics has established itself as a leader in the professional audio-visual field, with Aki at the helm. Despite his humble beginnings, Akbar Khan continues to work with both South African and international artists of the highest calibre and remains one of the most respected sound engineers in the country.