If Twitter is anything to go by, the lore of “Stella” lives on!
For fans of the Rhumba classic “Stella” by legendary musician Mwamburi Mwakachola, popularly known as Freshly Mwamburi, May 17 is the day the fictional Stella returns home.
The timeless classic, first released in 1992, paints a vivid picture of a man so in love with a girl called Stella, that he sold some of his property to finance her education in Japan. However, on the day of her return, the man is shocked to watch her descend from the plane with a child in her arms and a Japanese husband in tow.
In an interview in 2021, prompted by the release of his remix of “Stella”, Mwamburi surprised many of his young fans by confessing that the story in the song was based on his own real-life experience with a girl from Kangundo called Stella.
The beloved classic, which made Mwamburi a household name, has since become part of pop culture lore, with Kenyans reminiscing about the song and Stella every year on May 17.
The song has also gotten several iterations; Eric Omondi performed a version of the song on the streets of Nairobi in 2021 and more recently a cover by upcoming Kayte Melo posing as Stella, responding to the original song.
